


Polaroids

by stoprobbers



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Prompt Fic, Romance, Short, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-09
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-15 22:43:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 21,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13623048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stoprobbers/pseuds/stoprobbers
Summary: A collection of prompt fics originally published on Tumblr.This started as a place to collect Jancy Fanfic Week prompts. Now includes others. Chapter titles indicate where the prompts came from; the prompts themselves are in the summary.Jonathan might not shoot Polaroid, but if he did this might be among what appears.





	1. Jancy Fic Week Day 1: Anything Goes: write what you want!

**Author's Note:**

> Anything goes prompt: Maybe Nancy giving Jonathan a back massage after he's had a long day at work?? Thank you!

He’s not expecting her to be on his sofa when he gets home from work, but there she is. He drops his bag and kicks off his shoes and rolls his shoulders as she gives him a little wave.

“Hi.” She’s smiling. She’s so pretty when she smiles.

“Hi,” he echoes. “Where’s Will?”

“At my house. We swapped.”

“Swapped what?” he asks with a laugh, looking around the living room. The TV’s on, but she’s the only one there. “Lives?”

“Families. For the night.”

“Oh so you’re my sister now?”

She wrinkles her nose. 

“Definitely not.” 

He grins full at that, leaning down to kiss her briefly. He can feel her smile against his lips.

“Where’s mom?”  
  
“Her room,” Nancy answers, shifting a little on the couch. “She seemed tired.”

He pads down the hallway, sticks his head into his mother’s room. She looks up from a book, gives him a grin. 

“How was work?” she asks. He sighs.

“Long. I’m tired.”

“Well, I’m in for the night. Have fun with Nancy, don’t wake me up.”

“ _Mom.”_ He covers his face with one hand, mortified.

“Good _night_ , Jonathan,” she laughs. He’s still blushing when he returns to the sofa. 

Nancy’s tucked into the corner of the couch, her feet up on the cushion, and he sits in front of her so that if she opened her legs he’d be in the cradle of her thighs. His back hurts from doing inventory; and by “doing inventory” he means “lowering, checking, and lifting all of the boxes in their store room while Nicole made checkmarks on the list because  _you’re a boy, that makes you stronger than me_.”

And he is, he’s strong, but  _fuck_  his back hurts.

He rolls his shoulders again, twists back and forth a little bit, and sighs. Nancy makes a concerned noise behind him.

“You okay?”

“Just inventory,” he dismisses, and tries to change the topic. “Is this the Golden Girls?”

“So?”

 _“_ What are you, 90?”

“It’s a  _good show_ ,”she pokes his side but shifts at the same time, opening her legs and tugging him back into the space she’s made. “Here, lean back.”

He does, focusing on the television as she starts to knead his muscles with her fingertips. 

He closes his eyes, tries to give himself over to it. She hits one spot and it makes something in his neck move. He rests his chin on his hand, tilts his head left and then right, cracking his neck. That releases a little bit of it. He keeps his eyes closed and tries not to move around too much.

He loves Nancy. He loves her a lot. He loves her smile, and her laugh, and her brains and determination, loves how quickly she can come up with a plan and how good she is with a gun. He loves her lips and her hips and the sounds she makes in his ear late at night under the covers. 

He loves her enough to be honest with her, so he clears his throat.

“Nance?”

“Hmm,” she replies, still focused on the TV.

“You’re… not good at this.”

Her hands fly away from his back and when he turns her mouth is open in shock. 

“Rude!” she exclaims, smacking his shoulder. “I am  _trying_  to do something  _nice_ for you, Jonathan Byers, and  _you_ , you are  _rude_.”

He’s giggling at her exaggerated outrage as he draws her in for another kiss, this one longer and deeper. When they separate he turns back to the television, scooting back so he can lay against her chest. She wraps her legs around his waist from behind, begins to run her fingers through his hair. 

Her short nails scratch against his scalp and he closes his eyes, letting the little bolts of electricity run down his neck and spine, feeling his muscles start to relax. He hums happily, content to drift along as she keeps it up, until the dialogue on screen intrudes. 

“Seriously how can you watch this? Why are you so invested in the sex lives of septuagenarians?”

“Shut up,” she says, but her voice sounds fond. When she speaks again her mouth is right next to his ear. “I know you have a crush on Rose.”


	2. Jancy Fic Week  Day1: Anything Goes: write what you want!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jonathan. Nancy. Late for their City Hall wedding. David Bowie's Modern Love plays in the background. Go.

“But I never wave bye-bye, but I try!”

“Nance. Can you look for a parking spot?”

“I try!”

“C’mon, please?” He wants to be frustrated with her, he really does, because their appointment was six minutes ago and counting. He doesn’t  _know_  what happens when you’re six minutes late to your Justice of the Peace wedding ceremony because he’s  _never been married before_. 

At the same time, though, he’s about to get married and he’s just in a damn good mood.

“There’s no sign of life–”

“Seriously, Nance,  _we’re late_.”

“It’s just the power to charm–”

“ _Nancy!”_

“Oh, relax!” she giggles and keeps humming as she looks around the parking lot. Suddenly she points. “There!”

He sees the blue sedan backing up and guns it down the row. It jostles his soon-to-be wife but she seems to take it in stride, laughing as she picks the song back up. 

“Never gonna fall for modern love! Walks beside me! Modern love! Walks on by! Modern love!”

“Gets us to the church on tiiime,” he chimes in for one line before shutting the car off and throwing his door open. She whines a little but follows just as eagerly.

If anyone thinks anything strange of the two twenty-somethings running, giddy, through the City Hall parking lot in a black suit with no tie and a white satin minidress, they don’t say. He’s momentarily grateful for Indy’s limited anonymity. 

They’re home for spring break and they haven’t even graduated college yet and if their parents find out they did this he’s pretty sure both of them will end up dead. 

No, he takes that back. Their moms will be overjoyed. Ted might have a heart attack. 

He doesn’t want to kill his father-in-law on his wedding day. That’s  _way_  too much responsibility. 

Nancy’s still singing Bowie under her breath as they careen into the elevator and hit the button for the sixth floor. They’d memorized it a week ago when they snuck into the city to get their marriage license. Sixth Floor: Marriages, Divorces, ID Renewal. 

“You know, that’s not a love song,” he says, pressing her into a corner of the elevator. Her arms wind easily around his neck. 

“What?” 

He runs his lips up her jaw and back down her neck as he speaks. 

“‘Modern Love.’ If you actually listen to what he’s saying, it’s not a love song at all. It’s all about staying untethered, staying unattached, never letting anyone tie you down. About not letting love fool you into losing your independence.”

She pulls her head back far enough to meet his eye and she looks utterly exasperated. 

“You are  _such_ a killjoy, do you know that?”

He grins and swoops in to kiss her just as the elevator dings and the doors open. She indulges him for only a moment before she pushes him back and grabs his hand, pulling him out into the hallway behind her. 

“Come on, you nerd. Let’s get married.”


	3. Jancy Fic Week Day 2: Cliche Romance Trope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cliche with Jancy where one of them gets drunk and starts flirting with the other and trying to get them to go on a date

He doesn’t drink very often, she knows. It’s because of his father; his abusive, alcoholic,  _asshole_ father. She gets it. Lonnie Byers is enough to put anyone off of booze, herself included.

She doesn’t mind, though, because when he does drink it takes very little to get him drunk. And Jonathan Byers is a  _cute_  drunk.

She’s sitting on a stool in a dive bar on the West Side of Chicago with a beer dripping condensation onto the wood by her elbow and another beer doing the same beside it. 

Jonathan, on the other hand, is in the middle of the floor, dancing an off-kilter…  _something_  that she thinks is supposed to be the twist, with five or six half-full tables of blue collar workers and broke college students watching him with something kind of like awe. 

He’s using the dance the make his way towards her, and she rests her chin on her hand as she watches his approach. 

“Naaaaaaaancy,” he drawls as he sidles up to her. “Hi.”

“Hi yourself.” She grins back at him. 

He’s had two beers and a shot of whiskey. He half-sits on the stool next to hers and picks up his bottle, taking a long swig. She watches his throat work as he swallows.

“I have an idea,” he says, sliding fully onto the stool and inching it closer to hers. Their knees brush together. 

“Oh do you, now.”

“Yes,” he declares, and slams his beer onto the bar. The bartender looks annoyed, but doesn’t say anything. 

Nancy picks up her own beer and takes a delicate sip.

“I think we should go on a date.” He closes his statement with a definitive, declarative nod.

She almost snorts beer up her nose. 

“Excuse me?”

“A date,” he repeats, leaning in so their faces are close together. “You and me. Whaddaya think?”

His hand leaves the bar, slides up her wrist and onto the inner skin of her forearm. He traces some sort of braided pattern there and it sends shivers down her spine. 

She bites her lip, trying not to laugh.

“A date,” she echoes. Lets a smirk start to form on her lips, watches as his eyes follow the movement. His tongue sweeps across his lower lip and she wonders if he’s thinking about kissing her. “Is that so?”

“Mmhmm.” He nods and inches closer again. “I mean, think about it. All we have together. History, chemistry. Shared trauma.”

His brow furrows briefly like he’s heard that somewhere before, but instead of pursuing it he returns to his train of thought.

“Plus,” his voice lowers to a murmur and she has to lean in close to hear him, “you’re beautiful.”

That’s all it takes to send her into peals of laughter. She doubles over with it, barely remembering to put down her beer as she buries her face in her hands and giggles uncontrollably. When she looks up and he looks  _so_ offended that it sends her into fits again. 

When she finally gets herself under control he’s moved away from her, leaning back and staring across the bar at the dirty mirror covered with yellowed paper advertising out-of-date drink specials. 

“Jonathan,” she says, but he refuses to look at her. Sticks out his chin in a particularly petulant way, and she really didn’t think he could be any cuter. Turns out she was wrong. 

“Jonathan,” she tries again, reaches out and turns his face towards her. He looks hurt and mad, and she cups his face with both hands. “You ninny. We’re  _on_ a date.”

She kisses him before he can say a word. 


	4. Jancy Fic Week Day 2: Cliche Romance Trope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cliche AU prompt for Jancy: Laying under the stars when a shooting star goes across the sky

Indiana summers are usually hot, and humid, and still, but this night, this night is perfect. 

It is clear and there is a cool breeze as they lay on a large plaid blanket she snuck out of her basement in the small field hidden in the woods behind his house. 

The wind ruffles the skirt of her dress and she keeps one hand on her thigh to keep it in place. She keeps the other in the scant inches between them, hoping against hope he might reach out and take it. 

His profile is more delicate than he likes to let on. She glances at it in the moonlight, the swoop of his nose and the angle of his jaw, the dip in the center of his chin. His lips pout without trying and she’s wondered for so long what they’d feel like against her own. If they’d be chapped or soft or something between. 

His brother is hosting a sleepover, his mother is busy with her new boyfriend. It was easy to sneak him away and he was so willing. 

Thinking about the light in his eyes as he hopped out his bedroom window sends a shiver through her. Gooseflesh breaks out over her skin. He notices.

“You cold?”

His voice is soft, almost drowned out by the summer crickets.

“No,” she says automatically, and regrets it immediately. She’s telling the truth but perhaps she should have lied. Given herself a reason to scoot closer to him, maybe even curl into his arms. But she’s done herself in by being honest.

His hand moves from his stomach to the blanket beside her, and she can feel the warmth of his pinkie next to hers. 

If she wiggles hers, will they touch? Will he let them?

His focus remains on the sky and she follows his lead, returns her eyes to the inky blackness.

It is beautiful. Hawkins may be a shitty suburb in what feels like the middle of nowhere, but without the city lights the stars are oh so clear. 

“Do you remember the constellations?” she asks, hoping to fill the air. Hears his puff of laughter.

“Only some of them. Orion’s Belt. The Big Dipper. You know, the easy ones.” He pauses, swallows like he’s trying to work up the nerve to say something. “Do you–”

“Oh!”

Her gasp interrupts him and her hand flies up to point at the sky, at the streak of white light flying through the other, smaller dots. 

“Oh wow,” he says. “I’ve never seen a shooting star before.”

“My mom says they’re lucky,” she says before she can help herself. “You’re supposed to make wishes on them.”

“Oh.” He pauses, but only for a second. “Did you make a wish?”

There is something different, new in his tone. His voice is deeper than she’s used to, and a little raspy. She turns her head and finds him already looking at her, one eye partially hidden behind a swoop of dark blonde hair.

“Yes.” 

He felt further away when they were looking up; now his nose can almost brush hers and she can feel his breath, warm, on her cheek. 

“What did you wish for?”

She feels a heavy tug in the air around her, like magnets or a rubber band reaching its stretching point and snapping back. She doesn’t know whether she kisses him or he kisses her; one moment they are apart and the next they are pressed together. 

His lips are soft, his mouth is hot, and his taste sends something strong and wild through her soul.

“This,” she whispers against his lips. “You.”


	5. Jancy Fic Week Day 3: Comedy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jonathan and Nancy being assigned together for Home Ec class

He knew this new  _thing_  between them couldn’t just coast forever. That eventually they would meet a challenge, a crucible to test whether or not this was just chemistry and teenage hormones run amok, or something that very well could be true love.

He expected it to be something from the Upside Down; maybe the return of the demogorgon, or the Shadow Monster, maybe the next crack in the world and mortal threat to his family. 

He was ready for that. He was prepared. 

He was not prepared for Nancy to be assigned as his project partner in Home Ec.

He thinks he loves her. He’s almost positive. So he doesn’t really know how to tell her that he wouldn’t trust her near a stove even to boil water.

He saw her boil water one time. Her mom asked her to put the pot on for the noodles to go along with that night’s tuna casserole. 

He’s still not sure how she almost set the kitchen on fire doing that one simple task.

“I help my mom cook all the time!” she argues as he reads over the recipe they’ve been given for that day. It’s another kind of casserole, Hot Dish, and he’s seen his mom make it before. His mom’s not that good at it, but his mom’s not a good cook either. It’s pretty simple. He thinks he’s got this one in the bag.

“I’ve seen you help your mom,” he says softly, trying to keep this little discussion out of their teacher’s hearing range. “You chop vegetables, and then we all keep you away from the stove so you don’t burn the house down.”

“I’m not that–” She cuts herself off midsentence and he knows she’s thinking about it, recalling the dinners she’s had a hand in. 

He can see the offense and outrage break over her face and, honestly, she’s cute like this. If he could he’d lean in and kiss her until she forgets that she’s mad. Maybe he could even distract her to the point that she just lets him do the cooking and makes it up to him later. But they’re in the middle of fourth period and he can’t. 

Oh well. 

“I am  _not_ –” she starts again but he shakes his head, interrupt. 

“You are. You are terrible. You’re really,  _really_  good at other things - math, chemistry, bear traps, shooting a gun - but you’re an awful cook, Nance.”

“I can  _learn_. Isn’t that the point of Home Ec? To teach me?”

“You made a cake with salt last week.”

“I thought it was sugar.”

“The carton was labeled.”

“I was  _distracted_.”

“By what?” he laughs and is surprised when she blushes. “What?”

She mumbles something he can’t catch, so he leans in. “What?”

“I really like those black jeans,” she repeats, glancing down at his legs. 

He chokes on absolutely nothing and his face is on fire. He turns his back to the rest of the class in hopes they won’t see just how red he can turn. 

Their teacher clears her throat from the other side of their station and they both turn. 

“If you’d like to serve me something that  _won’t_ give me food poisoning, I suggest you get started,” she says and slowly walks away.

Jonathan sighs.

“Okay,” he says and leans in close. “Here’s what we do. You do the chopping. I’ll do the cooking–“

“Bullshit, Jonathan, I’m supposed to be  _learning_ –”

“And then I’ll let you take these jeans off later. Deal?”

He wishes he had a moment to pull out his camera, to take a picture of just how scandalized and intrigued she looks all at once. He’s started shooting color; he wishes he could capture how vividly she can blush.

She clears her throat and reaches for the chef’s knife and the onion.

“Deal.” 


	6. Jancy Fic Week Day 3: Comedy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nancy winning a stuffed bunny in a shooting carnival game for Jonathan

He’s trying not to squirm but he’s failing. He wonders if he can blame it on the heat and the simultaneous smell of fried food and animals that drift through the fairground air.

It’s  _definitely_  not because he just wasted two dollars at the shooting booth trying to win Nancy a prize. There  _should_  be a prize for shooting between the cans, he thinks. 

It’s not that she wasn’t sweet about it. She was. She hugged him and kissed his cheek and told him she doesn’t need him to be a good shot. He’s got plenty of other skills, she assured him, and he does, he knows he does. He takes excellent pictures, he’s good at setting traps, and he’s  _really_  good at making Nancy moan his name loud enough to almost wake their parents. 

He’s got skills. 

Just not… gun skills.

And Nancy does. Which is why she’s currently on her third round of perfect shooting, the pile of tickets growing in front of her. 

The shooting gallery worker tears his eyes away from Jonathan’s girlfriend and looks to him instead. Raises his eyebrows.

There’s  _judgment_  in that look, and Jonathan glares. 

Nancy lets out a whoop as she hits the last can and holds her hands out for the next round of tickets. She count them carefully, glances behind her at Jonathan, then turns back to the carny. 

“I want that one,” she says, pointing. Jonathan follows her finger and his stomach drops. 

The carnival worker uses a hook on a pole to pull down an enormous pastel pink stuffed bunny rabbit. He hands it to Nancy, who thanks him, then turns to face him. 

Jonathan takes a step back involuntarily. 

“Here honey,” she coos, “I got this for you.”

She shoves the rabbit into his arms, then promptly loses it, doubling over with laughter.

He glares while she laughs, glares while she catches her breath, glares as she takes off to explore the rest of the games. 

He tucks the giant rabbit under his arm, ignores the amused looks of his fellow Indiana State Fairgoers, and starts to plot his revenge as he follows her. 


	7. Jancy Fic Week Day 3: Comedy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jonathan and Nancy getting caught by Joyce and Hopper!

It started innocently. At least, that’s what they’ll claim later.

The party was going back to Mike’s after AV club, so it made no sense to go to her house. Not with an important English test in two days. And Jonathan’s mom was at work, which meant they’d have space, and quiet. And they had  _meant_  to study, they really had. They’d spread out their notes on the coffee table and she’d started making flash cards, and if she  _happened_  to be wearing his favorite sweater, well, it was her favorite sweater too. And not just because every time she wore it he got an irresistible urge to take it off. 

And so maybe their shoulders brushed when he leaned over to grab the flashcards. And maybe their arms pressed together on the couch. And maybe she put a hand on his thigh when she leaned over to point at a specific card, and  _maybe_  she let her fingers trip up the inseam, almost brushing against him before moving back down to his knee. And  _maybe_  that made him breathe her name and capture her mouth and press her back down into the sofa, which it turns out was surprisingly roomy.

Maybe.

But they had  _tried_ to study. They’d just also… failed.

Which was why she had a hand down Jonathan’s pants while he swirled his tongue around her nipple when the front door swung open and his mother walked in. Except they were both far too wrapped up in each other, in how heavily they were breathing and how she was trying to lift her hips and catch some friction on the leg he had between hers, to notice. At least, not until she yelped. 

“Jonathan!”

They froze. And then, in a move she knows she will never stop thanking him for, he dropped down on top of her, covering her completely. 

She’s pretty sure she’s the only one who heard his hiss as she wiggled her hand out of his boxers and carefully zipped him back up. 

“JONATHAN ALONZO BYERS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING ON MY SOFA?!”

Joyce is facing them, but she’s peeking through the hand clamped over her eyes like she’s watching a horror movie. Nancy supposes that perhaps she is.

 _She’s_  definitely in a horror movie, she thinks, because standing behind Joyce, openly gaping at them, is the  _fucking chief_. 

“Oh god,” she whispers against Jonathan’s ear. “Hopper’s here.”

“Kill me,” he whispers back, then louder, “Mom. Can we just–  _please_??”

There’s furious whispering among the two adults as they turn around and give them a moment to put their clothes back on. Nancy pulls her sweater back on fast enough to leave her hair standing on end from the static, and widens her eyes when she catches the dark mark on the side of Jonathan’s neck.

 _Oops_.

“I’m turning around in 5, 4, 3, 2–”

“We’re decent, we’re decent,” he says and she can hear the embarrassment in his voice, feel it rolling off him in waves as she sits beside him.

“What were you  _thinking_?” Joyce rounds on him immediately. “Will could have come home at any time! And do you  _know_  how much it costs to clean this sofa? Do you know how much I don’t want to have to take it to get cleaned, Jonathan?!”

“Mom–”

“I DO NOT WANT TO HAVE TO CLEAN THE UPHOLSTERY, YOUNG MAN!”

Nancy’s pretty sure she’s blushing so hard she’s about to burst into flame.

His mother sounds outraged, sounds mortified, sounds kind of amused, too, if she thinks about it, but with her focus solely on her son, Nancy sees an opportunity. Jonathan glances over at her, then at the hallway, then back at her. 

She’s going to tell him she loves him tonight, just for that.

She slips off the couch like a ninja and is halfway to the hallway’s entrance when Hopper clears his throat, bringing her to a halt.

“And where do you think you’re going?” he asks. 

She turns slowly. “Jonathan’s, um, room.”

“Is that so.” He sounds amused above all else, but there’s a definite edge of paternalism in his tone.

Which is when she remembers: Hopper’s not her dad. And he’s not Jonathan’s dad either. He’s Joyce’s friend and their ally, and maybe more than Joyce’s friend now that she thinks about it, but he’s  _definitely_  not either of their parent.

She straightens. 

“Yeah, what of it?”

He looks even more amused at that, and shrugs. 

Joyce is still yelling, something about responsibility and his future, when she sits down on the bed. 

It feels like forever. She examines her nails, her socked feet, tries to get her heartbeat under control. Gives up and grabs a  _Rolling Stone_  from the floor next to his bed and starts to flip through it. She can’t really focus on the words, just stares at the pictures until he joins her. 

As he’s pulling the door shut behind him his mother’s voice comes echoing down the hall.

“ _Don’t even think about closing that door, Jonathan!_ ”

He catches it at the last minute, leaves it ajar.

“Yeah,” he mutters as he plops down beside her. “As if I’m ever gonna get a boner again.”

“Well, I hope you eventually can,” Nancy says casually, tossing the magazine back onto the floor. “I was gonna take advantage of your boner later.”

He groans and buries his face in his hands. When he speaks, it’s muffled. 

“It was nice knowing you, Nance,” he says. “I really cherished our time together.”

“Is that so?” she laughs, tucking herself into his side. “And where are you going?”

“I’m gonna go walk into traffic now.”

She laughs and nudges him until he lifts his head and she can press a kiss to his lips. She cups his face, keeping him close even after they separate. 

“So… Alonzo?”

He groans again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I understand my middle name choice is controversial. It's definitely not canon (as far as I'm concerned, it's canon that Jonathan doesn't have a middle name, he's just Jonathan Byers and that rolls of Nancy's tongue just _fine_ , thank you). But I did actually have a long conversation about it and this is why I chose it:
> 
> Lonnie Byers strikes me as the kind of macho dude who would be very - even off-puttingly - excited about bearing a son. And he'd be the kind of macho dude who would insist his son has, in some way, his own name to pass down. Byers isn't enough; "Lonnie" has to be in there somewhere too. 
> 
> Lonnie is short for Alonzo. It's an Italian thing. And that's how we got to here. Feel free to rage at me in the comments, I don't mind.


	8. Jancy Fic Week Day 4: Smut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sweaty concert sex, please and thank you

The band is loud. The club is small and the crowd of bodies are pressed tightly together, making the air hot and humid. She can feel the sweat dripping down her spine underneath her tank top, feel the slick spot on her hip where Jonathan’s hand is pressed against skin, under her shirt and above the waistband of her shorts. The heat of him is almost unbearable. 

She has no idea who they’re seeing - this was his idea - but they’re less Clash and more New Order. The beat vibrating through the floor, the walls, their shoes, their bodies, is slithering and slinky, sexy. There is no room for them to create space between their bodies so his back is pressed against her chest, his lap against her ass. As she rolls her hips in time with the music she can feel him there, growing. 

He hisses, presses her closer, surges his hips into her rear when she drags across him in a particularly delicious way. Feels his lips at her ear and his voice more than she hears it in the din. 

“Don’t tease.”

Who says she’s teasing?

She throws her head back, shaking her hair away from her neck and against his chest, knowing he can feel it through his thin t-shirt. His grip tightens again. 

She plucks the beer bottle from the hand that’s still at his side, twists her hips again as she takes a swallow. HIs other hand creeps up from her hip, sliding over her top until his fingers jut barely brush the underside of her breast. She’s not wearing a bra and she knows he can feel it. 

HIs other hand now free, he wraps his arm around her waist and pulls her flush against his chest. 

“What’s your game?” he asks. Drags his teeth along her earlobe. She doesn’t try to hold back her shiver.

“No game,” she says and turns in his arms, pressing as much of her against him as she can. The crowd in front of her sways, pushes them closer together, and she lifts up on her toes to speak against his lips. “Fuck me.”

It could be the bass, but she thinks he growls. 

His mouth is punishing against hers, his hands readjust to slide into her back pockets and haul her against him. She can feel him against her stomach, hard and wanting. 

She’s about to work a hand into his pants when he rips his mouth away from hers and grabs her wrist, stopping her in her tracks. She’s about to as what’s wrong when he starts pulling her through the crowd. 

It is a blur of bodies, beers and graffiti until he pulls her through a door, shoves it shut behind her. She only barely catches a glimpse of a sink before he backs her against the door and claims her mouth again. 

They’re in the bathroom. Excellent.

She splits her attention between kissing him back and working on his belt buckle. She’s got his zipper halfway down when he pulls his hand out of her hair and stops her, pinning her hand against the door instead.

“Don’t. I can’t–” he warns and pushes against her. “Fuck, Nancy.”

He lets her hand go so he can pop the fly of her shorts open and she widens her legs for him, giving him space. Arches against him when his fingers brush against her then start moving in slow circles. 

“Please,” she whispers into his mouth. 

He abruptly breaks their kiss, looking to the side of her and fumbling with something with his other hand. She can’t pay attention, not when he’s sending spikes of heat through her, not when there’s sweat dripping down his neck. She licks a line down the muscle standing out there, tastes how salty his skin is. He groans and gives up whatever he’s doing. 

“Lock’s broken,” he mutters and pulls his hands out of her shorts. She whimpers in protest. He spins her around, presses his hardness into her ass. “Keep the door closed.”

She shivers and arches her back and plants her hands against the black-painted wood as he tugs her bottoms down. 

She hears his zipper fall the rest of the way and the clink of his belt buckle hitting the floor and then he’s right there, pressing against her, into her, stretching her wide. 

“Oh god,” she moans as he grabs her hips, starts to move. “Oh,  _fuck_.”

“Shhh,” he warns, as if anyone can hear her. She can feel the vibrations from the music in the door, presses her cheek to it as she pushes back to meet his thrusts. They don’t do it like this that often, she likes to look at him, watch his face, but when they do she feels unbearably sexy. If she listens, she can hear how much he wants her. Feel him panting against the back of her neck, his teeth grazing her skin as he ducks his head and doubles his pace. 

One of her hands flies off the door, reaches behind her until she can grip his thigh, dig her nails into flesh. He hisses this time, and one of his hands slides from her hips around to her front, pressing down in just the right spot to make her legs shake.

“Please, please, please,” he’s begging in her ear and she echoes him,  _wanting_. His fingers move frantically, his hips start to stutter. She closes her eyes and focuses on the slick of their skin, sliding, and how humid his breath is, and the heat of him inside her, and gasps as she sees stars behind her eyes.

She feels him spill inside her only a moment later, and his groan against the skin of her shoulder. 

They stay prone against the door for a long moment, waiting for their breathing to slow, before he carefully moves away from her. She shuffles to the toilet to clean up and watches him, back to the door and pants still around his ankles, face flushed and hair damp with sweat, chest still heaving with his back to the door.

He’s beautiful. 

After a moment he seems to realize he’s still naked from the waist down and quickly pulls up his pants. She returns to him, peppering kisses along his neck and jaw as he refastens his belt with shaking hands. Catches his lips on the third try.

She relishes the feel of his hands dragging lightly along her sides as she tastes him. Rests her forehead against his when she pulls away.

“You know, I actually wanted to see that band,” he murmurs. The door is no longer vibrating with sound; there is muffled cheering on the other side. 

She shrugs. She’s not sorry at all. 


	9. Jancy Fic Week Day 6: Sickeningly Sweet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jancy prompt: first movie night as a couple (eventually falling asleep on the couch)

Jonathan tries to hold back a yawn and fails. On the television screen Kevin Bacon is making an impassioned plea, Bible in hand, to allow the town to dance. He and Nancy are stretched out on the couch, her against his chest, over the top of her head he makes a face at the screen.

“I can feel that,” she says. He makes a face at her in response. “That too.”

“Shhh!” Will admonishes from his usual spot in his favorite lounge chair. He’s not looking at them, riveted by the movie, and Jonathan makes a face at him too. 

It’s Will he’s most annoyed with right now. His mom is working a night shift, his little brother was  _supposed_  to be at Dustin’s house for a sleepover. He was  _supposed_  to have the house to himself and Nancy, and he had some high hopes for his horror movie choices and what they could lead to. But Dustin has the flu and the sleepover was canceled and then Will sided with Nancy and wanted to watch “Footloose,” of all things, which he only rented because his mom asked him to. 

And now Nancy and Will are enthralled and he’s on the verge of falling asleep and Nancy is definitely not pressing her face into his neck as she looks away from the screen and he is definitely not sliding a hand up the back of her shirt as he holds her close. 

The best laid plans, etc., etc. he supposes. 

He feels Nancy giggle more than hears it, pinches her side in retaliation. She smacks his hand away with a louder laugh. 

“Oh my god, you guys are  _so annoying_ ,” Will whines.

 _Right back at you, bud,_ Jonathan thinks.

“You’re not charmed by Ren?” Nancy teases softly. “He’s so charming, and pretty. And those  _moves_.”

“No, I am not,” Jonathan murmurs into her ear. He lets his lips brush against the shell of cartilage, hopes it’s making her shiver. “I had something in mind.”

“Oh?”

Carefully, he slides the hand closest to the back of the sofa along her thigh, dipping under so his fingers just brush the inseam of her jeans. She shifts against him.

“Yup.”

“Oh my god, shut up!” Will says again and Jonathan rolls his eyes. He shifts himself and his girlfriend so he’s laying a little more fully on the sofa, and lets his eyes drift shut. He focuses on the feeling of Nancy’s fingers tracing patterns on the inside of his wrists and the sound of the movie in the background. 

The next thing he knows his mother his shaking his shoulder, waking him up. Nancy is still in his arms but her back is to the television and her face is in the crook of his neck; the TV is showing snow. He blinks up at his mom, slightly disoriented. 

“What time is it?” he manages, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes with one hand. 

“After 11:30,” his mom replies, looking at the two of them with a slightly raised eyebrow. “I’m gonna call the Wheelers and tell them Nancy’s staying here tonight, okay? It’s too late for you take her home.”

Her eyebrows raise higher. There’s a challenge in them -  _no funny business, mister._ Except Nancy’s snuck into his room in the middle of the night half a dozen times now so he knows it’s more like  _no funny business I can hear, mister_. That’s fine. He can be quiet. 

He nods and turns his attention to the girl in his arms, gently shaking her awake as well. She looks confused, disoriented, as she blinks her eyes open and he feels her inhale against his neck.

“What time–” she starts and he cuts her off. 

“Late. We fell asleep.”

“I should go home.”

“My mom’s calling your mom. She said you should stay tonight.”

Nancy’s eyes widen slightly and he chances a quick peck to her lips.

“We have to be quiet,” he whispers, then untangles himself from her. His muscles groan as he pulls himself to a sitting position and he flexes his left hand, trying to bring blood back into it. It’s fallen asleep and feels weird, disconnected, and painful as it comes back to life. 

They stand slowly, still blinking off their unexpected nap. He shuts off the television and leads her to his room, making a point to tell her where the pajamas are loud enough for his mom to hear in the kitchen. He stops to brush his teeth and wish her a good night before slipping into his room and closing the door tight behind him. 

Nancy is waiting for him, standing near the bed in one of his t-shirts, a Joy Division shirt long enough to reach her thighs. Her legs are bare and he takes a moment to stare at them before stepping towards her. 

To his surprise she steps forward to meet him, but not into his arms. Instead she carefully pushes him back until he’s sitting on the end of his bed, then smoothly straddles him. His hands automatically come to her hips, holding her in place. 

“What movie did you want to watch?” she asks brushing a kiss against his lips. He finds it hard to think when she’s sitting on him like this, and it takes a moment for him to remember what he rented in the first place. 

“I got Blade Runner. And Poltergeist.”

“Those are boring, and scary, respectively.”

“Okay, first of all Blade Runner is  _not_  boring, it’s  _amazing_ ,” she looks immensely amused at that but he doesn’t let it trip him up, “and second of all,  _yes,_ Poltergeist is scary. I told you I had something in mind.”

She laughs, has to bite her lip to keep from laughing too loud. Her eyes are dancing. He feels annoyed, and a little warm under his skin. 

“A horror movie, really? That is the oldest trick in the book, Jonathan Byers.”

He glares at her for a moment before gripping her hips a little tighter, turning them so she’s on her back on the bed before him and he’s standing at the edge of the mattress between her legs. He leans over her, bracing himself with a hand on either side of her head.

“It would have worked.”

She reaches up, grasps his face and pulls him down to meet her. 

“Yeah,” she mumbles against his lips, “it would’ve.”


	10. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOD DAMN bird + Jancy

She doesn’t know what’s supposed to happen now but she insists on going back to the house to help him. 

She stays at the hospital until she can’t stand it anymore and is sure they’ll be staying the night with Will. She’s not surprised, nor can she blame them for refusing to leave the boy’s side after their frankly insane rescue mission, but after a while the smell of antiseptic burns her nose and the cut on her palm stings and throbs and her head feels like it’s about to split into with the events of the last two days and the complete lack of sleep and so she asks her mother if they can go home.

She doesn’t look at Steve as they part in the parking lot, doesn’t kiss him goodbye, doesn’t know what to do after all of this so she just gives him a small smile and says thank you and stays close to her mother’s side.

When she stumbles downstairs in the early hours of the afternoon the next day it’s to Mike bouncing impatiently, waiting to tell her that Will has to stay in the hospital but Jonathan’s coming back to get home some clothes and more comic books and they have to go over  _right now_. 

She blinks and asks if she can maybe eat some toast first.

She’s halfway through the second slice with butter and jam when she suddenly remembers the (still bandaged) cut on her palm and the half-burned, blood-covered  _chaos_ of the house and jumps out of her seat. 

Her mother looks extremely unimpressed by her outburst but takes them anyway.

Jonathan and Mrs. Byers are just getting out of his beat up car when they pull up. 

For a moment there is chaos again. Her mother goes straight to Mrs. Byers, hugging her, exclaiming over Will’s miraculous return. Mike goes running up to Jonathan, shoving a stack of comic books into his hands and explaining, very seriously, that the one on top is from Dustin and Will won it in a bet and that he  _needs_  to give it to him. Jonathan nods, looking more tired and dazed than she’s ever seen him. 

She’s not even aware she’s made it to his side until the comics start to slip on his bandaged hand, the stack toppling, and she steps in to steady it.

Their bare hands touch and the warmth of his skin shocks her into greater wakefulness than she’s felt in days.

“Hey,” she says softly.

“Hey,” he echoes.

They turn to the house, the comics secure in his hands once more, and fall easily into step as they walk up to the front door. It’s open - not just unlocked but slightly ajar. She marvels silently at the fact that their little bullshit town is safe enough to leave your door open overnight, but not safe enough to ensure your child won’t be snatched by an interdimensional monster. 

She turns to Jonathan to say so and finds him already smiling wryly back at her, like he’s thinking the same thing.

Distantly she hears her mother wrangle Mike into the car and drive away.

He opens the door and they step through together.

The smashed ceiling has covered everything in a film of dust but she can see the trails of their blood on the floor and the scorch marks down the hallway from setting the monster on fire. Jonathan carefully sets the comics down on the front hall table, on top of sets of keys, and looks around like he’s in a dream. She thinks she might know the feeling.

“I can’t believe…” he starts to say, and trails off. Shakes his head. She watches his hair move; there’s still ceiling dust in it, and it’s greasy from the last two days. She wants to run her fingers through it.

“Yeah. Tell me about it.”

She steps closer to say something else, comfort him perhaps or affirm this shared experience, when the door creaks behind her and she hears a gasp.

Mrs. Byers is standing in the doorway. Her mouth is agape, shocked, and her eyes glitter with something that it takes Nancy a moment to place. It’s not until her gaze snaps over to Jonathan that she figures it out.

Mrs. Byers is  _mad_.

“What the  _hell_  did you two do to my house?!” 

Nancy freezes. Beside her she feels Jonathan do the same. For an endless moment no one moves or speaks.

And then she hears it, just to her left, as soft and playful as a dream: “Whoops.”


	11. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> nancy wheeler, "if you clone me, my first order of business will be to kill you all"

The first thing they do after the Gate is closed is sleep.

The second thing they do after the Gate is closed is drink. 

Well. Nancy drinks. So does Steve. Jonathan, he mostly watches.

Nancy cuts their vodka with water much like Murray did, but without the shaker and ice, so not only does it burn, it burns and is  _warm_. He nurses his vodka and soda, but Nancy and Steve seem to have no such restraint.

Steve’s face is still quite swollen and he is noticeably slow with the comebacks and Jonathan is  _pretty_  sure he should not be drinking (definitely sure, he’s definitely sure; he’s also sure he should be at a hospital but no one is listening to him and he’s not in the mood to take charge of anything, much less his romantic rival), but he swallows the vodka enthusiastically and doesn’t ask where it came from and for that, he is glad. 

They both went home long enough to shower and change before showing up, Nancy first and Steve enough on her heels that it’s almost like they planned it, back at his front door. Nancy had smiled wide and put her hand on his forearm and looked at him with her big, blue, haunted eyes as she reminded him of the booze in his trunk.

Before he knows it Nancy is sitting beside him on the porch, taking deeper and deeper pulls from a constantly refilled glass as she gestures at Steve, who is on the porch swing, and describes the underbelly of Hawkins lab, and he has  _no idea_  how they haven’t woken up his mother yet. 

“The stuff in there is  _weird_ ,” she’s saying, sweeping her arm out as if to indicate the basement of Hawkins lab is all around them and almost smacking him in the face. “Oh, sorry. But it was! Some of it  _glowed.”_

Steve looks at him, for confirmation maybe. Nancy does the same. 

Jonathan blinks and, after a moment, nods.

That’s enough for the girl to his right because she continues on with her tale, spinning it in taller and taller terms until if you took her at her word they pretty much setting the lab on literal fire as they walked out the door.

With each new story Steve’s eyebrows have crept further and further up his forehead. When Nancy finishes her yarn with a satisfied nod and a long drink to drain the glass, he turns his gaze to Jonathan.

“Really.” It’s not even a question; it drips with disbelief and amusement.

Nancy is leaning on him now, her cheek nearly against his shoulder, and for a moment Jonathan isn’t sure whether Steve is incredulous at this display of affection or what he’s just heard. After a beat of silence he figures it’s likely the latter.

“Um. Not exactly.”

“Pfft,” Nancy lifts up from his shoulder so she can smack it. “Traitor.”

“How am I a trai–”

“ _You_  saw it. The stuff down there, it was  _super_  weird.”

“Well, yeah, but we just, like, walked past it.”

“They do all kinds of weird shit down there,” Nancy says, shaking her head. “Not just weapons. Like, experiments.”

“Experiments like what?” Steve asks.

“Well,” Jonathan points out, “they did give a little girl psychic powers. My mom said it had something to do with drug tests in the Sixties.”

“Drug tests,” Nancy agrees. “LSD in the water. I bet there’s like… secret weapons. Weird guns and supersonic bombs. Invisible planes and UFOs.”

“They have UFOs or they make UFOs?” He looks down but all he can really see is her hair. She ignores him and keeps talking.

“ _Armies_ of psychic children. Or, like… Clones. I bet they have clones. Lots and lots of clones.”

“What if this goes wrong and they capture you?” Steve asks and Nancy’s head snaps up so fast she almost knocks Jonathan in the face. He just barely moves out of the way in time.

“Capture us?”

“Yeah, like, because of the leak,” Steve drains his glass and holds it out for more, a lot like Will does when his Mom splurges and they get a big bottle of Coke. Nancy grabs the vodka and pours some into his glass before flopping back down against Jonathan’s side. “If they trace it back to you.”

“They’ll never find us,” she boasts and giggles to herself. Jonathan wonders what’s so funny. “Plus, they’d be stupid to clone me.”

“Oh yeah?” he hears himself ask and he wonders why on earth he’d challenge Nancy Wheeler like that.

“Yeah,” she says and looks at him seriously. “I’ll take my clone army and kill them all.”


	12. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> monster teenz, I WILL PUT YOU DOWN AS A SOFT MAYBE

Is this some kind of revenge?

They’re both so animated. Nancy’s hair swings back and forth along her cheeks and she talks and gestures wildly with one hand, the other hand gripping the flannel sleeve of Byers’ shirt. And Byers, shit, he doesn’t know if he’s  _ever_  seen his eyes dance like this or, a smile this wide. He was sure that dude was incapable of excitement.

He can feel an awkward half-smile, half-grimace on his own face, one he knows he’s seen on Byers a million times, usually when he’s plopped down next to him in the cafeteria, offering unsolicited advice about Nancy and party invitations. He’s not  _proud_  to admit he likes to watch Byers squirm, but now that they’re actually friends (to Nancy’s delight; that’s not lost on either of them), he figures making him mildly uncomfortable on a regular basis is the least he can do. 

And he  _swears_  he sees the other boy’s eyes lock on it, the smile on his face become a little wider and a little sharper at the same time.

This  _has_  to be some kind of revenge.

“So do you want to come?” Nancy asks expectantly. Her eyes are clear and wide and ocean blue, utterly guileless. If this is a revenge plot, Nancy’s not in on it. 

“Uh,” he manages. “Who is this, again?”

“ _Steve_ , we  _just_  told you–”

“Yeah, I know, I’m sorry, I had a math test and it took all my, uh… thoughts.”

Byers is definitely smirking now and he feels the most ridiculous urge to punch him. Not  _hard._ Just a little.

Nancy launches into an explanation of this band again and he  _still_  misses their name even though he is  _trying_  to listen but Byers is just so goddamn distracting. He looks excited, he looks proud, he looks confident; basically he’s wearing the expression for every emotion Steve was sure he was unequipped to feel. Since when did Byers have a normal reaction to  _anything_? 

The confidence straightens his shoulders and smooths out his face and Steve  _doubly_  hates to admit that if Byers was like this all the time they would have been friends a long time ago.

He’s so irritated by that realization that he misses the name of the band  _again_  and only tunes in in time to hear, “You know, they’re kind of like Joy Division and New Order, but they’re also kind of punk too, so it’s less melody an dance and more, like, screaming.”

Ugh. Can’t the guy listen to  _normal_  music?

“Plus,” Nancy chimes in, “they’re playing in Chicago and I convinced my parents to let me go for the whole weekend, so we’re gonna get a hotel room and everything. Come on, it’ll be fun, you’re always bitching about how boring Hawkins is.”

He wants to say something about how little he wants to spend two days as their third wheel, but his brain record-scratched at “weekend.”

“Weekend? How’d you pull  _that_ off?”

“Told them I was looking at colleges,” Nancy shrugs and laces her fingers with Byers’, snuggles close to their side. “And so we will drive around the University of Chicago campus and memorize some building names, right?”

The younger boy gazes down at her adoringly and Steve wants to punch him again, harder this time. “Right.”

“So you’re coming?”

There are those ocean blue eyes again and there is Byers mimicking her friendly, expectant look, and shit, if this is what the guy feels like when Steve invites him to parties, well, he’s inviting him to a party every single Friday until he graduates just to make up for this awful, awkward feeling.

The bell rings. Jonathan reaches out and claps him on the shoulder.

“We’ll pick you up Saturday morning at nine.”


	13. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It had seemed such innocent pleasure + Jancy

The air in Jonathan’s bedroom is actually quite cold.

It’s that strange time of year between winter and spring and she imagines that the Byers probably save on their heating bill around now, turn the heat down or off a little too early and just layer up with sweaters to make it through. Jonathan does have an extremely impressive sweater collection. They’re soft and warm and very, very flattering and whenever he wears the dark striped one he was wearing today (or the mustard one, or the white one, if she’s being honest) she always gets the urge to run her hands under the hem and up his chest and to unbutton his pants with her teeth.

Which is, to be fair, what she did when they got home from school. When the house was quiet and empty, and his skin was soft and warm, so very, very warm. Which is why she didn’t notice, at all, how cold the air in his bedroom is. Not when he was on top of her, and inside of her, panting curses and her name into the crook of her neck.

Not until Mrs. Byers opened his bedroom door mid-sentence and he rocketed off her and straight into his own closet.

She’d barely managed to get his comforter up and around her chest in time to make sure Mrs. Byers didn’t see anything – or at least not a whole lot more than whatever eyeful she got when she walked in. 

She hasn’t said a word, hasn’t been able to  _remember_ how to speak, has only clutched the blanket to her chest and stared red-faced in his mother’s general direction. She’s trying not to look straight at her, is trying to not burst into flames with the heat of her embarrassment, is trying not to think about how she can hear the peals of Will’s laughter echoing throughout the house which means he was there too and probably got an eyeful as well.

Tries not to think about how he’s  _definitely_  going to tell the party. Which means he’s going to tell her brother.

Wonders if she wishes for death hard enough it might just come.

“Jonathan,” Mrs. Byers finally calls with a sigh. “Get out of the closet.”

There’s a brief pause before he calls back, “No!”

He sounds so petulant, so young, that Nancy finds she wants to laugh. Judging by the way Mrs. Byers bites her lip, she may not be the only one. 

Mrs. Byers looks like she wants to say something soft, perhaps apologize for the intrusion or Nancy’s humiliation, but she seems to remember she’s a parent first at the last second and squares her shoulders.

“You two get dressed,” she says firmly, “then we’re going to have a talk.”

She doesn’t wait for a reply, just closes the bedroom door.

For a stretching, nearly endless moment the room is silent and still. Then Jonathan’s closet door opens a crack and he sticks his face out halfway.

“Is she gone?”

Nancy glares at him.

“I  _told_  you to  _lock the door.”_


	14. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They say you should never meet your heroes, yet here I am at half past four in the morning, holding a taser and zip tie handcuffs + Nancy and Max

It’s sweet, Nancy thinks, that Max asked her to be here.

She knows the younger girl doesn’t have a lot, if any, friends outside of the party, and while she and Eleven actually get along now it’s not like Eleven can just go hang out backstage after concerts like every other 13-year-old girl they know. Or, the girls who have siblings who can take them to said concerts in the first place.

So when Max had asked her if she would go with her to see her favorite band, Nancy was happy to. And when Max admitted that she didn’t have  _tickets_  to the concert, but instead just wanted to hang out by the backstage door to see if she could meet them, Nancy understood. And luckily for Nancy, Jonathan was willing to drive them to Indianapolis and hang out in the car while Nancy helped Max fulfill this little fantasy. Even if it meant being out until well past midnight. Even if it meant lying to her parents.

She’s a little concerned about the backpack, though.

It had thunked when Max climbed in the backseat. Something clanged, metal on metal. When Nancy had asked, trying her hardest to keep her voice light and innocent,  _What’ve you got there, Max_? the redhead had just blinked at her and said  _Hmmm?_  before buckling her seat belt and pulling out a book for the drive.

And when she’d looked sideways at Jonathan his face had been as mask of “this was  _your_  idea” and since then he’d been no help at all.

Except the driving part.

Now he’s parked somewhere in the lot behind them, reading some dusty old book probably a Vonnegut novel, and she and Max are standing across the street from the arena’s stage door, slightly out of view of the security guard and the tour buses, and Max keeps checking her watch.

“Sooooo,” she tries. “What’s the plan?”

It’s a question she’s dreaded asking since she remembered the new squeaky floorboard in the Byers’ hallway. She’d discovered it at close to 4 a.m. on a Tuesday while letting Jonathan kiss her and walk her backward to the front door on the one night he’d insisted she didn’t have to climb out his window. No one had woken, but they’d stayed frozen in place long enough that if someone  _had_  there would have been no doubt about why she was there and what rules they were flouting. 

Jonathan had reported back the next day that Will said  _Mike_  told him about Max and Billy and the nail bat from the night Eleven closed the Gate.

The mental image of Max slamming a bat full of nails millimeters from her asshole brother’s crotch never fails to make Nancy smile.

“Well,” Max answers, checking her watch. “The concert should be over in about five minutes. I’m gonna need you to distract the security guard for me.”

“Oh yeah? While you do what?”

Max looks at her and grins. “Don’t worry about that.”

Nancy is frozen to the spot as Max hefts the backpack onto her shoulder and starts to walk to the curb. When she realizes Nancy isn’t following, she turns back.

“Aren’t you coming?”

There’s a light in her eyes Nancy’s only ever seen around Lucas and really, if you think about it, how much trouble can these kids get up to anyway? 

(She doesn’t let her mind answer that question, just tells it, firmly, to shut up.)

“Well?”

 _Oh, fuck it,_ she thinks and schools an innocent, flirtatious look onto her face as she follows Max to the stage door.


	15. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> jancy with SHE NEVER LOOKED LOVELIER THAN WHEN STUMBLING UP TO A LATE NIGHT DRIVE THRU AND STARTING AN ALTERCATION (sorry for all caps I just c/p!) 
> 
> Author's Note: This got prompted twice. =

He loves her. 

He loves her with all his heart and most likely all his soul. He loves her smile, her laugh, her determination, her bravery, her grit, how much she cares about her family and how much she loves him. 

But if she gets herself arrested tonight, that’s her problem.

The line at the drive-thru was too long and inside counter was empty, so he’d parked and asked her nicely to  _stay in the car, I’ll be right back with fries, I promise_. 

So of course she is standing at the drive-thru window arguing passionately with a poor, hapless employee who never asked for any trouble on this warm summer Friday night, much less the kind of trouble that is Nancy Wheeler after a six pack and vodka shots with a craving for french fries. 

He shifts the paper bag of greasy food into the same hand holding the medium Coke she didn’t ask for but will appreciate, and tries to let the annoyance surge inside him so he doesn’t have a fond smile on his face when he walks up.

He can feel it fail. It’s not that he’s  _not_  annoyed, it’s just that she’s so cute when she’s drunk and stubborn, as long as it doesn’t get out of hand.

“Now you listen to me–”

That’s his cue.

“Nance,” he says, squinting in the headlights of the car that’s  _trying_ to get to the window and gives them a sheepish smile, mouths ‘sorry.’ He doesn’t recognize the driver, thank god, but it’s impossible to miss the way the man glares at them both. “Come on. I’ve got our food.”

“You’re not the boss of me!”

“Nance–”

“No,” she says, not even sparing him a glance. “She’s got french fries  _right there_ , I can  _see_ them.”

“Yeah, they’re for the guy you’re blocking.” He holds up the paper bag, jiggles it at her. “I’ve got our food. Come on, let’s go.”

“Jonathan, I want my–”

“ _Nancy_.” Now the annoyance does surge and he grabs her arm, pulling her a bit away from the window and the drive-thru worker who looks both relieved and as irritated as he’s ever seen a person look. When she turns to him, ready to spit fire, he shoves the bag into her hands. “I love you, now eat these and stop threatening to fight the nice lady.”

He keeps his hand on her arm, gently pulling her away from the window and out of the lane of traffic while also making sure he doesn’t dislodge their food from her loose grip. She looks positively outraged and tries to dig in her heels, but the car she’s been blocking surges forward and he yanks her to his chest before it can clip her. Feels his heart pound from how close it came.

The bag of burgers and fries is hot through his t-shirt and Nancy is still glaring at him. He glares back and means it.

“You listen,” she says and her words are a little bit slurred. “I once took down–”

“A demogorgon, I know, I was there, eat your french fries,” he snaps, pushing the bag back into her hands as he regains his footing and resumes leading her back to his car. 

When he glances back at her she’s stuffing a handful of fries in her mouth and still glaring. The irritation lifts and he struggles not to laugh.

“I could take her,” she says, but it’s muffled by the french fries and that’s enough to break him. He leans against the trunk, putting the drink down on it so he can double over with laughter.

She stuffs another fistful of fries in her mouth as the glare softens into a pout and she leans on the car next to him. Sways a little bit and he straightens, puts his hands around her waist and helps lift her to sit on the trunk instead.

“Drink this.” He hands her the Coke, reaches for the bag and isn’t surprised when she clutches it tightly to her stomach. “Hey! There’s a cheeseburger in there for me.”

“Oooh, cheeseburger!”

“I said  _for me!_ ”

“What about me?”

“You wanted a hamburger.”

“I changed my mind.”

“I got you  _two_  large fries.”

“…But now I want a cheeseburger.”

“I will give you a bite if you give me the bag.”

“But it has my fries!”

“Oh my god.” He shakes his head and wrestles with her until he can get his hand in the bag and feel around for a paper wrapper. He’s relieved to find, when he pulls his hand back out, he’s found his cheeseburger on the first try. “This is why we can’t go to the McDonald’s in Hawkins anymore.”

“That is  _bullshit_ , we can go wherever we want.”

“No, Nance, we can’t. Not since you threatened to fight the manager because you forgot you ordered chicken nuggets instead of a burger.”

“Yeah, well I’ll fight  _you_ –”

He lifts the cheeseburger to his mouth with one hand and takes a bite, reaches out with the other and very gently lays it over her mouth.

She falls silent, glaring at him as he chews. He raises his eyebrows, waits.

And after a moment he hears a very muffled, “Fine.”

He gives it a minute but when he’s sure she’s not going to say anything else he removes his hand and offers his cheeseburger to her. She leans in and delicately takes a bite.

“Can I have fries too?” he asks as she chews. 

She reaches into the bag and pulls out a few, offers them to him. When it’s clear she’s not just going to hand them over he opens his mouth and leans in. 

And she smashes them right into his face.

For a moment he is gape-mouthed, stunned and frozen, as she breaks into loud peals of laughter, kicking her feet with glee.

He’ll have his revenge. He’s already plotting it. But man, does he love her. 


	16. Weird Bird Prompt Fics: Pick a character/ship and a bird caption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> MIXING A SEANCE WITH CHARADES SEEMED LIKE A FUN IDEA BUT OH CHRIST WHAT HAVE WE DONE? -the whole party

Mike’s pretty sure he’s gong to die tonight, but he’s not sure if it’ll be at the hands of his parents, his sister, or whatever this  _thing_ is they’ve apparently summoned.

That  _thing_  is currently manifested as what should be wispy smoke, but it’s far more solid than it looks because it’s flying in crazed circles around the Wheelers’ living room and knocking the pictures and vases off the top shelves. 

He hears a crash, watches a gilded vase shatter, and wonders if he will  _ever_ not be grounded again.

Dustin is somewhere behind him, screaming frantically, and he just wants him to shut up. 

“Dustin!” He yells. “Be quiet! We need to think!”

“We need to  _think?!”_ Dustin yells back. “We need to kill it!”

“But  _how_  do we kill it?!” Lucas shouts. He’s got Max behind him, backed into a corner for protection, but Mike has to admit the redhead looks like she wants a crack at the spirit herself.

“Mike’s right,” Will pipes up. “We need to calm down and think.”

“Calm down?  _Calm down_?!” Dustin shrieks. “ _You’re_  the one who summoned it!”

“You told me to!”

“You’re our cleric!”

“It’s not my fault!”

“How the hell did you even figure out the invocation?!?!”

“ _I don’t know!!”_ Will is screaming now too and Mike’s ears hurt. 

He wishes El was with them tonight. She might have stopped this hare-brained idea in its tracks, but even if she hadn’t she  _probably_  could fight this thing with her mind.

Maybe.

The thing swoops, makes a horrible screeching sound, then flies back up to the ceiling as if it means to go through it and up to the top floors. To everyone’s surprise - creature included - it doesn’t work; the thing smacks into the ceiling, bounces off it, and for a long moment floats in one place. Mike is holding is breath; everyone else seems to be too. 

Then the thing shrieks and resumes its dizzying circles.

“Dammit!” Lucas cries. 

“What the fuck!” Dustin echoes.

“OK,” Will says, and Mike’s not sure how he’s so calm. Maybe an angry spirit isn’t much of a threat when you’ve survived an alternate dimension and a possession. “How do we kill a ghost.”

“I don’t  _know,”_ Dustin shouts. “I’ve only ever seen ghosts in movies!”

“Well, how do they kill ghost in movies??”

“Salt,” Mike pipes up. “I think you can trap them with salt? Or keep them away?”

“OK,” Will nods. “Where’s the salt?”

“Kitchen,” Mike shrugs. Will nods and goes to move but when he does the spirit shrieks again and swoops towards him. He freezes, eyes wide. Mike throws his hands up. “Shit.”

“Indeed,” Max pipes up, raising an eyebrow. She looks almost amused. Mike glares at her. He’s about to say something when behind him he hears the front door swing open.

Oh  _fuck_. 

He closes his eyes for a moment, takes a deep breath, and turns around. Almost turns to jelly with relief when he sees Nancy and Jonathan in the doorway instead of his parents. 

They’re standing close together, almost as if they were kissing outside before deciding to take it up to her room, and that’s  _gross_  but at least they’re  _here_. If anyone can help, it’s Nancy and Jonathan. 

“What the  _hell_ , Mike?!” Nancy manages to yelp after a long silence. They’re both staring agape at the screeching thing still circling the ceiling. 

“Uh,” Mike tries. “Sleepover?”

“You know what,” Nancy shakes her head, dragging Jonathan by the hand as she stomps into the foyer, “I don’t want to know. Jonathan–”

“Yeah, yeah,” the teen says with a roll of his eyes as he pushes past her towards the kitchen. “I’ll get the salt and call Steve.”


	17. Prompt unknown: It’s the end of senior year, hot humid rainy summer day, the hum of the fan blaring, and jancy..

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s the end of senior year, hot humid rainy summer day, the hum of the fan blaring, and jancy..

The air is thick, oozing along her skin through the open window. The Byers’ AC has been out all week, but an empty house is more important than a cool house, so the windows in Jonathan’s room are wide open and the fan is creaking from its precarious position on his cluttered desk, and Nancy stretches her bare legs long, keeping sticky thighs carefully separated as she drops her head back and closes her eyes.

From the speakers comes a liquid voice, a song about longing and walking and searching, and beyond it is the steady beat of the rain. Despite the fan’s valiant effort nothing in the room seems to move – not a breeze, not time, even her heartbeat seems slow in her chest. She lifts her head and feels a bead of sweat drip from the nape of her neck down her shoulder blade. 

She doesn’t hear footsteps, doesn’t even feel the dip of the bed before something freezing cold and slightly wet in the center of her back, shocking against bare skin. Her back arches involuntarily and she sucks in a breath with a hiss. Behind her Jonathan chuckles, his voice dulled by the humid air.   
  
“Sorry,” he says, sounding anything but. He doesn’t pull the can away, instead rolls it between her shoulder blades, bra strap to bra strap, as he settles behind her. One of his legs hooks over her hip and she runs her fingertips through the hair on his calf. In the quiet heat they’ve both stripped down to their underwear. After a moment of cold bliss the can is suddenly gone.  
  
“Oh don’t stop,” she pouts, turning to him.   
  
“You’ll just make the soda warm.”

She’s about to respond, something petulant on the tip of her tongue, but he replaces the cool aluminum with his lips, tracing a line up her shoulder blade to the curve of her neck. She sighs instead and tilts her head to the side, making room.

“Patsy Cline?” he murmurs against her skin, working his way slowly towards her ear.   
  
“Mmm.” Her eyes slip shut as he dots a kiss to her earlobe, nuzzles the sharp corner of her jaw with the tip of his nose. His other arm snakes around her waist, and even though her skin burns with the heat of the day she presses closer, twists to try to capture his cheek, his mouth, any flesh she can taste. His hair brushes her nose and it is damp with sweat. The sensation sends a different kind of heat straight to her center.   
  
They way they’re twisted together his throat is pressed to her shoulder and she feels more than she hears him hum along to the song. He has a lovely baritone, one he’s reluctant to let others hear, but it makes something inside her melt, makes a well of feelings bubble up from the core of her and through her heart like a fountain of warm molasses. He slides his lips, just barely parted, along her jaw and she waits, ready, until he’s perfectly lined up and she can twist sharply and kiss him.   
  
The can is still cold as it rolls down her thigh and thunks onto the floor, forgotten. His fingers thread into her hair, wide palm cupping her cheek as he kisses her back. It takes some wriggling and wiggling but eventually she manages to lay down and pull him on top of her. Settled comfortably she releases his shoulders and stretches her arms long above her onto the mattress. His hands trace up and down her sides, counting ribs and measuring the curve of her waist, as she lets herself be well and truly kissed.   
  
When he pulls back his eyes are dark and his cheeks are flushed and his long hair is hanging over his eyes. She smiles lazily up at him and lifts one hand, raking the strands off his forehead as he sits gently, straddling her thighs.   
  
“What?” he asks as she strokes her hand through his hair another time.   
  
Her grin remains as she raises her eyebrows. “What?”

“What are you smiling about?”

She scoffs at that. “You, duh.”

His blush darkens. “Stop.”

“No,” she teases, sticks her tongue out. “You can’t make me.”

“Is that a dare?” He leans down, bracing himself with hands on either side of her face. She waggles her eyebrows at him.

“No, but if you think that’s going to make me  _stop_  thinking about you, you’re an idiot.”

He chuckles, and she watches a bead of sweat roll from his forehead down his nose, hang suspended at the tip. She cranes her neck and manages to kiss it off before it can fall. Feels the skin wrinkle under her lips.

“Gross.”

She shrugs.

He dips his head to make it easier for her to brush her lips against his. Returns to sip from her mouth as he slowly tips to the side, settles next to her with his leg still thrown over her lap. She watches his eyes drift shut as she cuddles closer, counts the lashes that fall against his cheeks.

“I don’t know what you see in me.” 

She feels the honestly slip through his light tone, lifts one hand to his cheek and lays it there.

“I see you,” she murmurs, feeling his breath on her lips. “My boyfriend, my best friend, my music nerd, my monster hunter. An amazing brother, an incredible son. And us, our new life in a new city with a new world at our fingertips. Also maybe an apartment with air conditioning, please and thank you?”

His laughter is more breath than voice but the rise in the corners of his mouth is real and it makes her heart lift. She waits for his eyes to open, nudges her nose against his when they don’t. “Jonathan…”

They open for only an instant, a flash of deep swirling brown before he presses his mouth to hers. The air is thicker between them, sweat making skin slide easily against skin, but as he slides a hand up her flank and onto her ass, using the flesh to steady his grip and pull her closer, she finds she doesn’t mind.   
  
“Nancy.” Her voice sounds like a prayer breathed into her mouth and she presses closer, as close as she can.

“It’s you,” she whispers back. “It’s definitely you.”

They don’t notice when the record ends, and beyond the open windows the rain beats a rhythm as steady as their hearts.   
  



	18. Happy Birthday, fakelight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> happy birthday og jancy great fakelight, who requested her birthday gift be:  _hiding out in a bedroom with a stolen bottle of wine during thanksgiving/holiday party_

“Shh!”

“Nance—“

“I said  _shh!_ ”

“Nancy—“

“ _Jonathan_ ,” she pauses halfway up the stairs, finger still poised by her mouth, “If you don’t  _talk_  then they won’t  _hear us_  so  _shhh!_ ”

His mouth twists in that way it does when she’s annoyed him, and as always she wants to lean in and kiss the scowl right off his face, but they’re on a mission, a  _time sensitive_  mission, so she turns and scurries up the stairs as fast as she can.

In stocking feet she is nimble and near-silent on the blue carpet. Jonathan’s still in his Chucks and not so discreet. She whirls when she reaches the top landing, presses her index finger to her lips and hisses it again: “ _Shhh!”_

“Oh my god,” he sighs, slowing his pace and lifting each foot ridiculously high and lowering it slowly, carefully, to place each sneaker down deliberately. It makes him look like a cartoon caught in a dastardly plan and she bites her lip to hold back a giggle.

As if the party below has caught on to her thoughts, a burst of laughter drifts up the stairs behind him as Jonathan joins her on the landing.

“OK what now?” His arms slide around her waist.

“Follow me.”

It a little awkward, the way he has to shuffle behind her to keep from stepping on her heels, but it’s worth it to feel the heat of his chest at her back through the crushed velvet dress her mother picked out for her. It’s a deep, Christmas-appropriate shade of forest green and while she thinks the style is a little childish for a new high school graduate with its empire waist and long sleeves, the way Jonathan’s been looking at her out of the corner of his eye all night has kept any complaints unvoiced.

He lets go when she reaches her bedroom door, follows her in and closes it carefully behind him. He’s not scowling anymore, but the furrow between his eyebrows remains and Nancy finds she wants to kiss him all the same.

“So what’s this all about?” he asks, sliding his hands in his pockets as he follows her to the edge of his bed.

“It’s about…” she turns, reaching up under her dress to claim her prize before whirling back around to face him, “this!”

The open bottle of champagne glints in the soft light of her bedroom, and the way Jonathan’s jaw drops is appropriately satisfying.

“Where the hell did you get that from?”

“The kitchen.”

“No, I mean—where did it come from?? It just appeared… you just…?” He makes a motion with his hands she takes to mean,  _I’m extremely confused, please explain_.

“I snuck it up here. In my dress.”

“In your  _dress_?” he takes another step forward, maneuvering her by the upper arms to and fro, twisting her around and bending to look closer at the fabric. “But, where?  _How_?? I didn’t see— Did you put it in your bra?”  
  
“Just the top of it. To keep it in place!” 

“Is that a new bra?” for a moment he looks contemplative. “It has to be, your bras aren’t that tight.”

“Wait, what?!” She stops his twisting, elbows him out of the way to take a swig. 

“I took your bra off  _last night_ , I think I would have noticed if it was sudden hard.”

“I’m sorry, are you saying my bras are exceptionally easy to take off?”

“Maybe not  _exceptionally_  but I’ve been taking them off one-handed for, like, a year, Nance.” He turns her to the side again, considers the empire waist of the dress. “Doesn’t it— It would make a lump, wouldn’t it make a lump?” 

He reaches for the hem, is about to pull it up to check underneath when she bats his hands away, laughing.

“Hey, hey, if you wanna get under my skirt it’s gonna take a  _little_  more effort than that.”

“No it’s not,” he murmurs, but stops his search anyway. The fond smile that slowly blooms across his lips makes something deep in the pit of her stomach go warm and soft. “You’re ridiculous, Nance.”

“That’s why you love me.” She grins back at him for a moment, then raises her eyebrows. “So where are the glasses?”

“Glasses?”

“You were supposed to grab glasses! I told you!”

“No, you wiggled your eyebrows at me and said ‘Follow me,’ you did not say anything about glasses.”

She groans and flops into a seat on the edge of the bed, hearing the fizz of the champagne as it’s jostled.

“That’s what the eyebrows were for, they  _clearly_  said ‘Jonathan, get some glasses so we can drink the champagne I stole,’” She sighs, takes a swig from the bottle and holds it out to him. “I guess we’ll have to make do.”

”I suppose so.” He takes the bottle, and a swig, and then nearly knocks her in the face with it as she stands just as he’s trying to give it back. “What are you doing now?”

Suddenly, she wants to make that little scowl come back so she can kiss it off him this time. Grinning slyly, she wiggles her eyebrows at him. The grin turns genuine when it works.

“Yeah, no, I’m not even gonna try until I get a manual, or a decoder ring, or something like that.” Still, he doesn’t complain when she presses her lips to his.

He also doesn’t stop her when she grabs his tie, loosened at the collar, and pulls him gently around the end of the bed to the other side, the pocket between her bed and her window where she can’t be seen from the door. He stays standing, amusement written on the crinkle at the corner of his eyes and at the edges of his mouth, as she sits on the floor and looks expectantly up at him. She takes another long draught from the bottle as he folds himself onto the floor next to her. Tips her head onto his shoulder as they get comfortable, curled slightly into one another.

“There we go,” she sighs and closes her eyes for a moment. Relinquishes the bottle easily when he reaches for it, takes it when he passes it back, slides his arm around her shoulders. “Perfect.”

“Hmm?”

“This.” She opens her eyes to find him already looking at her. “Mom’s been making us help with this party for  _days_  and it’s all  _their_  friends, you know, and a whole, like,  _performance_  for them. I just needed a break.”

“It is a lot, isn’t it?” His grin is rueful.

“A Karen Wheeler spectacular,” she sighs and takes the bottle back. “She’s drunk now, though, so I don’t think she’ll notice I’m gone.”

“Oh, she’s been drunk for a little while, she came awfully close to missing my cheek when she kissed me hello.” Jonathan raises his eyebrows at her. “And I was only an hour late.”

She snorts at that, she can’t help it, almost getting champagne up her nose even as she tries to school her expression into something stern, outraged even.

“Well, I will not stand for this,” she says, drawing herself up until her back is straight but the giggles threaten to overtake her mock seriousness, “I’m not going to let her ruin your good name, _or_  try to make a move on  _my_ boyfriend. Gimme a minute, I’ll set her straight right now—“

She can’t finish her speech, though, because his mouth gets in the way. She only barely remembers she’s holding the champagne before she drops the bottle entirely, manages to reach out and put it to the side of her nightstand without making a puddle on the floor.

Her arms wind easily around his neck and her fingers tangle in his hair as he leans her back into the corner between her mattress and nightstand, using a hand on her flank to guide her leg around his hip and shifting onto his knees in the space he’s created.

He’s so easy, she thinks, but then, so is she.

She’s pushed off his jacket and is working on unbuttoning his shirt while one of his hands creeps up her inner thigh under her dress when her bedroom door opens.

“Hey, Nance—Ugh! No! Gross!”

They freeze at the voice; Jonathan’s head shoots up and their gazes lock. His eyes are wide but his mouth is swollen and shiny and Nancy just wants Mike to go away and let her get back to kissing him.

“ _What_ , Mike,” she grits out instead.

“I was just gonna warn you mom’s looking for you. And the last bottle of the champagne. I didn’t  _ask_  to see this, you know!”

“But, but— How did you even— “ Nancy sputters. She hears the hinges creak as Mike pulls the door shut behind him, but it stops before it closes fully.

“You guys  _always_  forget about that mirror.”


	19. Fic Prompt: Sick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> anonymous asked:
> 
> jancy fic idea “don’t kiss me i’m sick”

He shouldn’t be laughing at this. He really shouldn’t. He cares about her, loves her, would do just about anything for her. He should wipe the grin off his face and still his bouncing shoulders and _stop laughing_ because he knows Nancy Wheeler, and she is going to murder him if he doesn’t.

She huffs, or tries to huff, but her nose is stuffed up and the tip of it is a shining, cherry red, and it get stuck and instead sounds like a snort gone wrong, and she looks even more offended at _that_ and he’s doubled over with laughter once again.

“Screw you,” she pouts, crossing her arms. She’s wrapped up in his sweatshirt and, he’s pretty sure, the entire Wheeler household’s collection of blankets, and she looks absolutely miserable and somehow beautiful at the same time.

“Sorry,” he says, but there’s no remorse in his voice. He reaches for her, shifting closer so he can pull her into his arms, but she struggles, tries to push him away. “Aw, c'mon Nance. You’re just cute, that’s all. Come here.”

“ _Jonathan_ ,” she admonishes, trying to push him away, but he’s bigger than her, stronger, and her reflexes are dulled by illness. In less than a minute she’s practically in his lap, her back against his chest and his arms around her shoulders. She huffs again and sniffles as she settles back against him.

“I don’t feel good,” she says softly after a moment. 

“I know, I know, I’m sorry,” he says, and leans down to press his lips to hers. It’s the best comfort he can offer; he can’t take away the cold, can’t do much more than visit and bring her homework and try to cheer her up.

For a moment she looks utterly confused and just before he makes contact she turns away and he gets her cheek instead. He frowns at her and gets a roll of her eyes for his troubles.

“I’m _sick,_ you moron,” she repeats. “Trust me, you don’t want this.”

“Nancy, I’ve been hanging out in your room after school all week. I’m pretty sure I’ve been exposed.”

He also misses kissing her, but he’s not about to say that out loud. He’s got a pretty strong immune system, he doesn’t get sick that often; he thinks he can handle it.

“And _I’m_ pretty sure sticking your tongue in my mouth is worse than breathing my air,” she points out as he starts to trail light kisses from her cheek to her jaw and then up to her ear. He doesn’t miss how she leans into his touch, how her fingers tighten on his wrist and how she sighs softly.

He uses his finger to turn her chin until she’s looking at him, gives her a smile and rests his forehead against hers for a moment before tilting his head and leaning in properly. He can feel the heat of her lips under his, lets his eyes slip shut, and that’s when it happens.

She sneezes.

They’re so close her forehead knocks painfully into his and he’s suddenly so glad his eyes were closed because his face is… wet. She’s jerked away from him, out of his arms, but he is just frozen in place.

He can feel the grimace on his face; can practically hear Nancy’s mortification. He carefully opens one eye, then the other and sees her wide-eyed look of horror, her hand covering her mouth in shock.

For a long moment neither of them speaks. Slowly, she reaches behind her with her other hand and brings out a box of tissues, holding them meekly out to him. He plucks one delicately from the box and runs it over his face before opening his mouth.

“Thanks.”

Her hand is back over her mouth but her eyes are dancing now, her shoulders shaking. Soon she’s the one doubled over in laughter, using her own tissue to wipe at tears of mirth.

It’s the first time he’s seen her laugh since he’d come over to see her Monday, to ask why she didn’t need a ride and hadn’t shown up for class, only to find her miserable and cold medicine groggy as her mother tried to get her to eat some soup.

If he had to get sneezed on to make her laugh again, well, it was worth it.

Plus, he’s _definitely_ been exposed to her germs now.

It takes some work to get her untangled enough from the blankets to push her onto her back but she’s gone limp with her laughter so it’s easier than it would have been. He brushes one, two, three kisses to her lips and sighs when her short nails scrape against his scalp as she pushes her hands into his hair. He nudges her mouth open, just barely dips his tongue inside before she pulls away a little.

“I can’t breathe through my nose, it’s all stuffy,” she giggles.

“I’ll make do,” he shrugs and cuts her off with another kiss.

When she shows up three days later, while he’s cocooned in his comforter and trying, unsuccessfully, to stop blowing his nose long enough to sleep, it’s with a thermos of her mom’s homemade chicken soup and a sheepish grin. He eats his soup with a smile and starts to plot his revenge. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear I thought this story was already in here. It is not new, but apparently I never posted to AO3. So, enjoy.


	20. Minific prompts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 3\. things you said too quietly

She watches the shadows on her ceiling, yellow streetlight through leaves. The way they move in the winter breeze reminds her of the ash falling through the air in the upside down. 

She swallows and tries to force the thought away, but her grip on the walkie tightens nonetheless. 

It’s Mike’s old one, barely working and long-replaced. It can’t do much more than beep when she presses the push to talk button, but that’s all she needs. Well, that and the little Morse code card she pilfered from the basement at the same time. 

For months she only sent distress signals ( _dot-dot-dot, dash-dash-dash, dot-dot-dot_ ), cries for help as she clawed her way out of nightmares or counted minutes of sleep slipping away. He always answered. 

He still does. It’s just that their… circumstances have changed since the summer. 

She grins to herself, tightens her hand on the walkie again, tempted to resend her message even though she’s sure he’s no longer at home. Her signals have gotten a little more creative lately, too. 

She’s not sure if he translates everything she sends, or if he just knows it means she wants him to come over. Sometimes she hopes he doesn’t – she’s gotten kind of silly with the outdated abbreviations on the back of the alphabet card. Mostly she hopes he does. 

 _Dot-dot, dot-dash-dot-dot, dot-dot-dash_. 

The shadows on her ceiling darken, a brighter light in the street, and she glances at her bedroom window, but nothing appears. 

Her middle finger finds the push to talk, taps out the call again:  _Dot-dot, dot-dash-dot-dot, dot-dot-dash_. 

There’s no response, no CONFIRM ( _dash-dot-dash-dot, dot-dot-dash-dot, dash-dash_ ), not the new code he’d come up with recently, his own YES DEAR ( _dash-dot-dash, dash-dot-dot, dot-dash-dot_ ). Because his walkie is on his bed, but he is not, not anymore. 

She closes her eyes and hears the wood-on-wood slide of her window opening. 

“Brr,” she murmurs as the gust of wind hits the skin not under her covers. 

“Sorry.” His voice is as soft as ever, rough from hours of disuse. 

The only sounds in her room are the quiet tap of the window shutting, the clack of him setting the walkie onto her nightstand. He slips silently into bed behind her, wrapping himself around her, tight against her back. 

She puts her hand on top of his where it rests on her stomach, lets out a contented sigh as he nuzzles his nose into the hair at the nape of her neck. Her finger moves on its own, a feeling bubbling out in action when she finds the words stuck. 

 _Dot-dot, dot-dash-dot-dot, dot-dot-dash_. I-L-U. 

“Oh, Nance,” Jonathan whispers, his own finger tapping out his response on her stomach even as he speaks it aloud. “I love you too.”


	21. Minific prompts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things you said while we were driving

It’s so soft he almost misses it.

“We could keep going.”

“Hmm?” Jonathan hums, reaching over to turn down the volume on the stereo. He’s been using it to cover the rattle in the engine, which is new. He thinks it might be the fan belt.

Nancy’s hand comes up from where it’s resting on her thigh to cup the back of his neck. Her feet are up on the dashboard, and she’s slumped low in her seat. He glances at her and finds her staring out the window, profile backlit in the mid-afternoon.

“Nothing,” she murmurs, then seems to reconsider. “I just… I just said we could keep going.”

They’re driving through the cornfields that line I-70, the podunk town of Sesser and the weird, industrial home they’ve been holed up in having shrunk to a microscopic dot on the horizon in his rearview mirror an hour ago. They haven’t spoken much, just enough to subsume the gnawing anxiety about not getting an answer at home beneath the diffused warmth of knowing this thing between them has changed for real this time, become what he’d dared to hope it could be.

He contemplates the road ahead, straight and mostly empty and extremely boring. Her fingers tighten in his hair and he waits for her to continue.

“Do you ever think about it? Just… getting in the car and driving away? Going somewhere where there’s no shadowy government organizations and no people tapping our phones and no dead best friends and no monsters? Where there’s just us?” Her thumb skims his jawline, rubs his earlobe, sending tingles down his spine. It takes some effort to keep his eyes on the road and his focus on her words.

“Of course.” It’s not a difficult admission. “I think about it all the time.”

“You have a car. Why don’t you do it?”

“My mom and Will—“

“You could bring them.”

“My mom would never,” he chuckles, shaking his head. Swallows hard. “And… and you.”

“Me?”

“I wouldn’t leave you behind. I couldn’t.” He wonders if she understands what he means.

“I’m here now. Do you want to keep going?”

He risks looking at her and finds her looking back at him, eyes wide and serious but not without sparkle. Half-serious, then.

He wants to say yes. He wants to find somewhere small and quiet with no one else around and he wants to bury himself in her – his body, sure, but his soul too. He wants to whisper his secrets into her skin and leave an invisible record with her, share himself with just one person who seems willing to help him carry his loads. And he wants to run from the shadows, too, and to pretend the last year never happened.

But then, if the last year never happened they wouldn’t be here, would they? And beneath that warmth the gnawing fear surges forward, reminding him that there’s a rock in the pit of his stomach and a reason he’s pushing his car past 65 to get home.

“I– I need to check on—” 

“Your mom and Will,” Nancy finishes for him. There’s a resigned note in her voice but she’s grinning knowingly at him

“You wouldn’t just leave Mike behind,” he points out, “or the rest of your family.”

“I wouldn’t,” she agrees, dropping her hand from his neck. He frowns, wishes she’d put it back. “But I’ve thought about it.”

He’s quiet for a moment, trying to figure out what to say next, but the words just slip out. “One day.”

“One day what?”

“One day we’ll hit the road, drive until we find somewhere worth stopping and staying, even just for a little while. We’ll pick a direction and just go.”

“We?”

“Yeah,” he reaches out, grabs her hand and holds it tightly, as if she’s giving him strength. Maybe she is. “I don’t think I’d ever be able to leave mom and Will if you’re not with me.”

He reorients his grip, lacing their fingers together tightly and lifting their hands so he can press a kiss to the back of hers. Chances another look at her and finds her smiling back at him, hard.

“Can you pull off at this exit?” she asks, nodding out the windshield. He looks at the sign, the selection of gas stations and diners advertised under a town he doesn’t recognize.

“Are you hungry again?” He’s already changing lanes.

“A little, I guess, but mostly I really want to kiss you and I don’t think I can do that when you’re going 70 miles an hour.”

He needs to get home, needs to make sure everything’s okay, but it’s not the first time his mom would have taken Mike and Will to a Saturday matinee. They can keep going, just them, a while longer. He rests their hands on his knee and takes the exit.


	22. Minific prompts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 8\. things you said while you were crying

Mrs. Byers is the first to break the silence when the light fades.

“We should get you cleaned up.” She addresses a spot over her sons’ heads but it’s clear she’s talking about Will. Nancy follows her gaze to the wall but she doesn’t seem to be focused on anything in particular. “I think I saw some towels in the linen closet.”

Jonathan nods and stands, crosses the room to fetch them. Nancy watches him closely; his shoulders are tense and he’s looking through things too.

Nancy stays in her seat, watches the Byers family move like clockwork robots to get Will into the bathroom, hand him a towel, turn on the faucet to draw a bath. Nancy watches Jonathan watch Will and his mother stare at the filling bathtub warily, like a slowly approaching enemy.

His hands clench rhythmically at his sides, closed, open, closed, until he spins on his heel.

“I think—I might—I might have some extra clothes in my trunk.”

He’s still talking to the room at large, and though his eyes sweep over her when he passes her on his way to the door she feels his gaze go through her like glass.

There  _are_  clothes in his trunk – their overnight bags, stuffed with nightgowns and t-shirts and bottles of vodka and soda. She can’t remember if she saw anything else in there when they left Murray’s.

Ten seconds pass, fifteen. Mrs. Byers’ voice floats out of the bathroom, late and absent, like she’s just remembered it’s considered decent to reply to a person when they speak to you.

“Thanks, sweetheart.”

The bathroom door shuts then, not waiting for a response if Jonathan was even there to give one.  _No problem, Mom_ , she responds for him, his voice clear in her head.  _No problem at all_.

She should help, she thinks. Strip the bed, maybe, or go looking for a stash of clothes. The cabin looks lived-in, there’s probably some old clothes stored somewhere.

Or, she could check on Jonathan. He seems like he needs checking on.

It’s the thousand yard stare, she decides. They’re all shellshocked after what they’ve just seen, what they’ve just  _done_ , but he looks like the zombie soldiers from history class, stumbling out of the battlefield trenches, across desiccated meadows, with their gazes somewhere beyond this world. And they’ve both seen enough reality bending for a lifetime.

She’s not even aware she’s outside until the leaves crunch under her shoes.

Jonathan’s beat up car is still parked out front, just beyond the trip wire Mrs. Byers accidentally set off in the short walk to the cabin. She’d cursed Hopper to hell and back in that five feet while Jonathan just clutched Will tighter to him.

His driver’s side door is open and so is the trunk, just enough light spilling out for Nancy to make out Jonathan’s silhouette through the window.

She catches the sound of a deep exhale just before she rounds the door.

He’s sitting sideways on the bench seat, elbows on his knees and head in his hands. She has her suspicions but it’s only when he looks up that she can see he’s crying.

He doesn’t cry like she does, or Barb, or Mike, or anyone else she can think of. His shoulders rise and falls smoothly, stuttering only occasionally and when they do he doesn’t make a sound. Tears cascade down his face, his expression blank and abject all at once, almost absently, like the emotions and guilt have grown too big for the space inside him and he’s leaking.

“Jonathan,” she says softly, reaching out to brush tears from his cheeks, and he flinches back. His eyes meet hers and for another moment he’s looking through her, beyond her. Then his pupils dilate and his gaze snaps into focus and he’s present in front of her once more.

“I’m fine.” He shakes himself - not just his head but his shoulders, his entire torso - and catches her hand to stop her while he uses the other to wipe wetness away himself.

“I don’t think you are,” she ventures. That brings hardness into his eyes, a defensive twist to his mouth and she grabs his hand. “I don’t think any of us are, really.”

The hardness melts away and he chuckles – hollow but a laugh nonetheless. The chuckle turns into a hitch, which turns into a catch, which turns into a stutter and then a muffled sob. She tightens her hand around his and when he tugs she goes.

There’s nowhere to sit next to him so she settles carefully on his lap, using the hand he’s not holding to encourage him to rest his head on her shoulder. He buries his face in the crook of her neck instead. She rests a cheek on the top of his head and closes her eyes.

His fingers dig into her shoulders and hand, like they did in the cabin, but instead of keening he simply breathes against her until some of the tension leaves him and he has himself more under control.

“Nance,” he says, voice hoarse and tender. His face shifts against her, repositioning so his lips are brushing her collarbone, his eyelashes are feather soft and damp on her throat, and she tries to hold back a shiver. “Can I— I just wanted to say—“

“It’s okay,” she answers automatically, not sure what she means. He doesn’t have to speak, perhaps, or he doesn’t owe her an explanation. She saw the same things he did. She doesn’t know if she would have survived it, if it had been Mike.

“No, not—I’m just, I’m glad you came. I’m glad you’re here.”

That’s how, she realizes. If it were Mike. When it was Barb and a monster with gray skin and a mouth like a carnivorous flower. When it was dull steel against her skin and then blood hotter than she ever knew it could be. And in a stifling room full of screams and sobs, his hand in hers. That’s how she would have survived it. That’s how she will, the next time it comes.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he repeats, clutching her tighter. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

She clings to him in return, winding herself around him to form a knot she hopes no one could ever undo.

“Me too.”


	23. Word Prompts: Petrichor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> petrichor: the smell of rain falling on dry earth

She rockets out of sleep so suddenly it takes her a moment to realize what woke her in the first place. 

Beside her, Jonathan doesn’t even stir. Catching her breath in the darkness she spares him a glance, tracing the shape of his body beneath the heavy blanket. 

When she can hear past the rush of blood in her ears, her pounding heart, she listens for the rest of the house beyond the just-barely-cracked door of Jonathan’s bedroom. It doesn’t sound like anyone else has stirred. Distantly she can hear snoring at different pitches; Hopper’s deep rumble, Steve’s mid-tone drone amplified by his swollen, definitely broken nose, the higher snorts of the half dozen children sprinkled throughout the house, too exhausted to wake. 

Beside her Jonathan is silent and absolutely still; the only thing that indicates he’s not actually dead is the slow rise and fall of the blanket over his chest. 

The flash of light catches the corner of her eye just before the crack of thunder sounds, closer than the one that woke her and so loud she jumps. Jonathan makes a little noise, somewhere between an exhale and a harrumph, and shifts onto his side, curls up tighter, and falls still again. 

She pushes the blankets off her legs and carefully climbs out of his bed. The handful of steps to his window hurt – her joints are stiff and muscles are sore and her back feels like someone beat it with a stick; literal days worth of tension, and stiff car seats, and unfamiliar mattresses finally catching up to her. 

Where the makeshift curtain is pulled back she can see water droplets rolling down the windowpane, and beyond that veritable sheets of rain. 

The water makes the world outside wobble and she’s transfixed. She can’t remember if it had been cloudy that night; when they got home, yes, but she sort of thought it cleared. Somewhere in the back of her head she sees Jonathan walking out the Byers’ backdoor, Will in his hospital gown and limp and clutched tight to his chest, and she swears she remembers moonlight glinting off his hair. 

She thinks back to following whatever was left of the Mind Flayer out of the front door of the cabin, watching it dissipate in the Hawkins night, but she can’t remember seeing any sky beyond the trees.

She wonders if the monster caused the storm, if it’s like seeding clouds. If this rain is tainted, if it’s filled with the essence of evil that escaped the Upside Down and came this close to killing them all,  _again_. If it hit her skin would it burn like acid, or would it infect her? Is it infecting the ground, right now? 

The idea of it seeping into the very soil, following them in the mud clumped on their boots even after they leave this room, this town, this life, makes something in her chest clamp tight and stay that way. Her stomach churns and tumbles. She feels heat, radiating from her skin and from the air in Jonathan’s room and it’s too much like the cabin, too much like the interrogation room in the lab, too much like everything they’ve been through and she’s suddenly so sure they’ll never escape. 

She draws a shaky breath, trying to get herself back under control, and a scent hits her nose. Without realizing it, she’s reached out and pushed the window open. The air is cold, and smells earthy and crisp and  _fresh_. 

It clears the heat wrapping itself around her head and she breathes in again, a little longer and steadier this time. The drumming rain is louder now and the scent is stronger. She’s so entranced by the storm outside she doesn’t notice any other movement in the room until Jonathan’s hand touches her hip. 

“You okay?” His voice is hoarse, rough from sleep, bleary. 

She’s sure if she turned around his hair would be sticking up on one side, his eyes swollen with sleep. Instead she draws another breath and leans back until she’s supported against his chest. There’s only a moment of hesitation before he slides his hand from her hip to her stomach and pulls her fully against him, strong and sure. She breathes again and lets the air and the feel of him push the last of the fear out of her chest. 

“Thunder woke me up,” she offers. With his other hand he reaches past her for the windowsill and she makes a soft sound of protest. “No, don’t.” 

“The water’ll damage my records,” he explains through a yawn and for the first time she really registers the stack of them directly in front of the window she opened. “And the stereo.” 

“Oh, I didn't…” She feels her cheeks burn, wonders why she’s so embarrassed. 

“S'okay,” he keeps her clutched close to him as he pushes the window almost all the way shut, leaving enough of a crack for her to still feel a breeze. “Come back to bed?” 

An entirely different flush suffuses her and she thinks he must realize how that came out at the same time she does because he steps away from her like he’s been burned. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean—” 

“Oh, I hope you did.” She turns and catches his hand before he can retreat, even though there’s barely a foot between the window and the bed. Cups his cheek with one hand and lets her thumb stroke his cheekbone. His eyes slip shut and she’d think he was falling asleep on his feet if he didn’t lean into her touch, nuzzle her palm just slightly. 

“Alright,” he whispers. “Then come back to bed.” 

She doesn’t bother to walk around to the other side, climbs up the mattress and tucks herself in against his chest, knees stacked together and nose in the crook of his neck. She breathes in deep again, the scent of him and the sheets and underneath it all that same smell from the outside, of rain and storm and cleansing. Of renewal. 

With the steady drumming of the rain and the beat of his heart and his thumb rubbing circles on her hip she falls back asleep.


	24. Word Prompt: Anagapesis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anagapesis - The feeling when one no longer loves someone they once did

She really hopes she’s not gonna be sick.

The world is spinning and rolling and bumping and her stomach is churning, churning, churning; a wine-dark sea at the mercy of the storm inside her.

She frowns, then grins, then hiccups, then chuckles. Wine-dark sea. That’s Homer.

“What’s so funny?” Jonathan asks to her left. She lolls her head towards him, closes first one eye and then the other to get the two silhouettes to resolve into one. She knows there’s only one Jonathan Byers beside her. She knows there’s only one Jonathan Byers, period.

One Jonathan. One Steve. One Nancy. The math is still bad.

“Homer,” she replies, and giggles again. Saying it is funny too.

“O…kay.” He leaves it at that.

He hits a pothole and she bounces and winces and swallows hard to keep that wine-dark sea inside.

She let it out a little tonight, and it was bad. A little gap in the dam and there’s a flood, sweeping away Steve’s heart with it. Her vision might have been blurry but she’s not blind. She saw the hurt in his eyes.

She wishes she felt the same hurt. She feels nothing, really, except nauseous. That, at least, she can swallow against. Her feelings flowed out of her a long time ago, draining through a leak in her soul. She kept trying to fill herself up over and over again, with Steve and his love, but out it went, drip, drip, drip, and she stayed just as empty as she’d ever been.

She didn’t notice the leak become a crack, become a hole, become a gaping maw until it crumbled the ground beneath them both and swallowed him up, too.

“I’m a bad person.”

The car slows, which lets her know she said it aloud.

“What?”

“I’m a bad person,” she repeats. “I killed Barb, and lied about it. I couldn’t even get her body back I just lef–” she’s interrupted by another hiccup. “Left her there. Rotting. In that place. That whole place is ash and rot and now she’s ash and rot too and I juuuust leftherthere.”

“You didn’t leave her there.” He argues, though she doesn’t understand why he’s bothering. “You couldn’t get her back. There’s a difference.”

“Doesn’t matter,” she shrugs, swallows again. “Issmy fault, anyway. I killed her and then I didn’t do anything about it and I lied about it and I tried to be okay, to be normal, but I lied about that too. It’s all bad math.”

“Math?” He sounds lost. She rolls her eyes.

“Issa odd number. One and one and one, is three.”

“Got to be good looking ‘cuz he’s so hard to see?”

She frowns. “Who’s good looking?”

“I—nevermind.” He laughs a little but sounds embarrassed. It’s confusing. She crosses her eyes as she tries to remember the point she was making.

“No it’s– None of her and one of you and one of him and one of me, it adds up wrong,” she ticks it off on her fingers. “The equation is  _unbalanced_  and I can’t solve for y and now everyone’s sad, because I’m a bad person. Issmy fault. Issall my fault.”

“Nancy–”

The churning in her stomach sharpens suddenly, turns into a veritable typhoon and she sits up, rod-straight and breathing hard through her nose.

“Jonathan, pull over, I feel– I think–”

She’s throwing the door open before he even stops moving and braces herself against it as the wine-dark sea inside her spatters on the pavement below. She retches hard, gasps for air, and shuts her eyes. It hurts and it tastes awful, like cheap liquor and too much Kool Aid powder, and she has to fight back tears in an effort to keep even the smallest amount of dignity. Squeezes her eyes closed even tighter when she feels Jonathan’s warm hand on her back, rubbing in wide, steady circles.

“It’s okay, you’re okay,” he’s murmuring as she retches again. “Just get it out.”

“I’m sorry–”

“It’s okay,” he repeats. “It’s okay, Nance, you’re okay.”

She’s not. She’s not okay at all. She feels like she’s being crushed, by sadness and guilt. She closes her eyes against it, against the next dry heave that wracks her slight frame, but when she does all she can see is Steve’s face, the hurt blossoming there, the betrayal. She had looked at him in that bathroom and she’d been angry, so angry that he couldn’t see this coming. That she had been beside him for months, losing herself piece by piece, dissolving from the inside into a shell of who she used to be, and he didn’t even notice.

Now the anger doesn’t burn, it just aches in the same dull throb she’s felt for weeks. The emptiness inside her feels massive, so much bigger than her skin can contain, and as she braces her elbows on her knees and holds her head in her hands, breathing against the last waves of nausea, she tries to remember. When was the last time he said something that made her laugh, really laugh? That he held her and she felt safe in his arms? That he kissed her and her blood fizzed, effervescent just because he was near? That she called him just to talk and just to listen?

She can’t remember. She felt it once, she knows, and maybe again after everything that happened last year, but not in a long time. She thought she had just been going numb. Maybe that wasn’t it at all.

“Finished?” Jonathan’s voice is gentle and she blinks her eyes open. Take a moment to think about, to force herself back into her body. There’s still a storm inside her but no churning sea.

“Yeah. Thanks.” She lifts her feet carefully, one then the other, and places them back in the car. Looks down at her lap and is pleasantly surprised to find she managed to avoid her skirt entirely. Good job, her.

She keeps her eyes trained on her lap as he closes her door, crosses to his and climbs back in the car. She doesn’t look up when he turns the engine back on, doesn’t look up at all until he thrusts a thermos into her line of sight. She takes it automatically.

“It’s just water,” he says sheepishly, like having water in his car is something to be embarrassed about. He gets bashful about the weirdest things, she swears.

“Thanks,” she says again and takes a sip as he pulls away from the curb. When she’s had her fill she twists the cap shut and leans her head back, closing her eyes. She doesn’t recognize the music playing softly on the stereo.

“You’re not bad at math,” Jonathan says after a few blocks of silence. She carefully opens one eye and looks at him as skeptically as she can manage. “I don’t… I don’t really know what equation you’re trying to solve, but you’re not bad at math. And you didn’t kill Barb. A monster did.”

“I told her–”

“You didn’t kill her. You didn’t know. You couldn’t have known. And you can’t blame yourself, Nancy. It’s not your fault.”

She doesn’t respond. She knows a lie when she hears one.

“And that’s not a lie.”

Both eyes snap open this time and she trains a full glare at him. He keeps his eyes on the road, ignores her ire.

“You don’t know–”

“I don’t, you’re right,” he interrupts and she closes her eyes again. “But I know you didn’t kill Barb, I know you did everything you could to kill that monster, and I know you didn’t just  _leave_  her there to rot. There’s a difference between leaving someone behind and not being able to go back for them. You’re not a bad person, Nancy. You’re brave, and you’re strong. You’re good.”

The motion of the car and the soft surety in his voice are like a spell, weaving a cocoon of warmth and safety around her. She wants to pull him tight around her like a blanket and stay there until she’s not scared of the shadows in the corner of the room anymore.

“No,” she protests, but she can’t remember what was supposed to come next anymore. Her reasoning. Her why. She can feel herself drifting away.

“You’re good, Nancy,” he repeats. “You are good.”

She doesn’t stir until he parks in front of her house and she feels his hand under her knees. For a moment, half asleep and unbound, she almost lets him lift her, almost lets him cradle her against his chest, almost takes from him the things she’s doesn’t allow herself, in her waking hours, to want.

His fingers are warm on the back of her thigh and that’s enough to break the spell.

“I’ve got it,” she says, another lie on the pile. “I can do it.”

When she falls asleep for real there are two pairs of brown eyes that follow her; one searching for something she cannot find, the other hoping for something she’s won’t admit she wants to give.


	25. Word prompt: strikhedonia

If his mouth wasn't so busy, he thinks he'd probably be laughing.

As it stands his mouth is _quite_ busy –sucking spots on Nancy’s neck, dragging teeth over her collarbone, sliding along her breast until he can swirl his tongue around first one nipple, then the other. Somewhere in the back of his mind he’s astonished at how slim she is, how his hands span nearly her entire ribcage and back as he lifts her slightly on his lap so her chest is more level with his face. Of course she’s slim, he knows she’s slim, he has eyes, but it’s different when she’s actually here in his hands.

She’s making the most delightful breathy noises above him and he grins against her skin just before she grabs his hair and yanks his face up so she can kiss him again.

He’s got his back to the wall the guest bed is pushed up against and truth be told he doesn’t quite know how he got there. He’s not really sure of anything that happened after Nancy slammed the door shut behind them; he was far too busy tasting her, touching her, breathing her in.

He’s thought about this countless times. Spent night after night imagining what it would be like to kiss her and stroke her, wondering what sounds she would make and how hot she would be when he pushed inside her. As her hips grind down on his and she tugs on his bottom lip with her teeth, he realizes he may just be on the verge of finding out.

He should be nervous. Hell, he should be _terrified_. He’s a virgin. The furthest he’s gone with a girl was in the back room at work after closing, hands fumbling down the front of her jeans and responses that seemed more like a performance than honest reaction. Not to mention he’s absolutely head over heels in love with Nancy. It makes his chest ache and his head spin and he’s put his heart on a platter for her to stomp on if she’d like to, now or after. He should be shaking like a leaf.

But he’s not. Well, he is shaking a bit, but it’s not from fear. Bolts of pleasure send shudders down his spine from Nancy’s nails scratching over his scalp, her mouth slanting over his, her hips rocking against his lap, along his hardness even with layers of cloth still between them. Her bare skin sliding over his, chest to chest, and puffs of breath on his cheeks as she lets out of soft, rhythmic moans.

Every other goddamn day of his life he’d be up in his head, worrying. Worrying that he’s smaller than Steve, shorter and slighter, slimmer and less muscular. Worrying that he’s less experienced – barely experienced at all, really – and clumsier. Worrying that she will regret – right now, or right after, that she’ll pull away and say, _No, no, this is a mistake, we shouldn’t do this, I don’t want this_. He’s not, though. For whatever reason his head refuses to wander down What If Lane. His head is, apparently, committed to staying right here, right now.

Fucking _finally_.

He fumbles his hand between them, looking for the spot to make her gasp, and can’t help bucking up against her when she does, yelps, stills against him. He manages to get his eyes open, to look up at her flushed cheeks and furrowed brow as she tips her head back, gulping down air and digging her fingers into the bare skin of his shoulders. He feels the bite of her nails and knows he’ll have ten half moon-shaped indentations there.

“Oh god,” she stutters out, and he wants to look at her like this, just like this, forever.

Fuck his stupid head and his weirdo reputation and his extremely small amount of experience. Fuck the conspiracy theorist whose house they’re in, the interdimensional monsters that haunt them, the nightmares, the trust issues, the retreat. Somewhere between the study and the guest room he’s lost all of his fears, his cares, his concerns. _Fuck it_ , he thought in the dark on that awful, too-springy sofa bed. _Fuck it, I’m going to tell her how I feel. Fuck it, I’m going to kiss her. Fuck it all_.

It echoes around his head as he pushes her panties to one side, dares to touch her directly, vision going fuzzy when he feels how wet she is. _Fuck it, I’m going to touch her. Fuck it, I’m going to taste her. Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it_.

“Fuck—” It slips out his mouth by accident as Nancy grinds down on his hand and his eyes flutter shut from the heat of her. When he opens them again she’s looking down at him, her expression more mischievous and wicked than his imagination had ever been able to conjure.

“Oh, yes please,” she replies, pert and cheerful like she’s answering a question in English class. He can’t quite come up with a response, just makes a dissatisfied sound when she rolls off him.

It takes a second for his brain to register that she’s done so to get out of her underpants. His eyes widen a touch and he scrambles to do the same, pushing his pajama pants and boxers down in one go and hoping he doesn’t look too eager doing so.

By her smirk when she straddles his lap again he’s not sure he’s succeeded.

 _Ah, well_ , he thinks. _Fuck it_. Fuck it all. Because Nancy is hovering over him, one hand on his shoulder and the other between them, grasping him, squeezing him, positioning him just right, and in the back of his head he knows there’s a question he’s supposed to be asking – something practical, something important for later, something to make sure this isn’t the beginning and the end of them all at once – but he can’t remember what it is. He can’t remember anything that exists outside Nancy Wheeler and he doesn’t particularly want to, maybe not ever again.

Then she’s sinking down on him, hotter than his wildest dreams and so unimaginably soft, and he does laugh. He laughs loud and bright and free, everything inside of him expanding with joy and relief. Digs his fingers into the fleshy parts of her hips and tips his forehead against hers. 

And against his lips he feels her smile back.


	26. Minific prompts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 4\. things you said over the phone

She’s breathing hard, knuckles white around pale blue plastic. Her eyes are wide but almost unseeing. The dark is suffocating.

“Breathe, Nancy. Breathe. In, out. In, out.”

His voice is hushed in the middle of the night. She tries to follow his instructions. 

“In, out, okay? What do you see?”

“Its face.” It hurts to push the words out. Her lungs feel tight and though she’s still panting she doesn’t feel like she can get enough air. “Teeth."

Petals of teeth and blood and strands of red hair. Blonde hair. Both. Wrapped around the teeth.

“Breathe, Nancy,” he repeats. “Open your eyes.”

“They’re open.”

“Then  _look_. What do you see?”

She blinks. The darkness starts to resolve itself. “My door. The poster, the painting of a cat.”

“Okay. What else?”

“My desk.” She tracks her eyes slowly to the right. “My cork board. My… my pictures. Of her.”

“The same pictures you see every day, right?”

“Yes.” It comes out a whisper.

“Keep going.” His gentle urging helps her focus.   
  
“My homework,” she continues, allows a small chuckle. “The hamper, the closet. The–”

The word gets stuck in her throat. In the dark, something moves.   
  
“What is it?” There’s an urgent note in his voice.   
  
“Something moved. In the shadows.”

“What shadows?”

“The ones in the corner–” her breath quickens again, panic rises, blurring the edges of her vision, “In the corner of– where my–”

She stops. Her vision clears. The edges of the world sharpen again.   
  
“Where your what?”

“My mirror,” she answers, sagging in relief. “It’s my mirror. It’s me, in my mirror. That’s what moved.”

He laughs. Louder than he should, and genuine, and she can’t help but join him.   
  
“There’s my window,” she continues, not needing his prompts anymore. “The bench. My chair, with the blankets on it. My night table. My bed. Me.”

“Good.” His tone is so fond she blushes a little. “That’s good, Nance. Are you good?”

“It was warmer,” she says before she can help herself.

“Huh?”

“When you were… when you were here. It was warmer, in my, uh, in my bed. I couldn’t sleep but you were warm and it… it helped. It was so cold, in that place. You were so warm, I could remember I wasn’t there. I don’t think any warmth would survive there.”

She’d almost touched him that night, her hand hovering over his bare arm and feeling the heat of him. She’d pulled back at the last second.  
  
There’s pause on the other end of the line and something inside her clenches, embarrassed. She almost wants to snatch the words out of the air, take them back, but it’s too late now.

“I, uh,” he starts, stops, tries again. “I’m… glad. That I could keep you warm. I’m glad it helped.”   
  
He doesn’t sound embarrassed, or regretful. She can’t identify the note in his voice. There’s a tug in her, a question she’s wanted to ask for so long, and she lets it slip out.

“Would you stay here again?” She rushes it out, words almost tripping over each other. “When… when this happens, if I asked you when I called, would you come?”

Another pause, longer and somehow even more silent. She can’t even hear him breathe. She wonders if his mouth is still by the phone or if he’s pulled it away from his ear to look at it. She can imagine him staring at it like it’s come to life or grown horns; she can imagine his shock at her forwardness. She bites her lip and waits.   
  
“Yes.” It floats down the line just barely louder than a whisper. His voice shakes, and she wonders if his heart is beating fast like hers is - and not from fear, not anymore. “Yes, I would.”

“Good.” Her pounding heart stutters, and something dizzying and warm floods through her. “Thank you.”  
  
“Goodnight, Nancy,” he says and she thinks she can hear the soft smile on his face.

“Goodnight, Jonathan.”


End file.
